Jadunath Sarkar

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Jadunath Sarkar
Born
10 December 1870
Karachmaria, Bengal Presidency, British India


Occupation
Historian



Sir Jadunath Sarkar, Template:Post-nominals (10 December 1870 – 19 May 1958) was a prominent Indian historian and a specialist on the Mughal dynasty.

Sarkar was educated in English literature and worked as a teacher for some time but later shifted his focus to history research writing. He had vast knowledge of the Persian language, and he wrote all his books in English. He was vice-chancellor (VC) of the University of Calcutta from 1926 to 1928 and a member of the Bengal Legislative Council between 1929 and 1932. In 1929 the British knighted him.[1]

Early life and education

Sarkar was born on 10 December 1870 in the village of Karachmaria in Chhatardighi, Singra, Rajshahi district, Bengal Presidency (now in Natore District, Bangladesh).[2][3] His father, Rajkumar Sarkar, was a local zamindar and owned a large library. His mother, Harisundari Devi, had seven sons and three daughters, with Jadunath being the fifth child and third son.[4] In 1891, he graduated in English from Presidency College, Calcutta.[4] In 1892, he topped the Master of Arts examination in English at Calcutta University, and in 1897, he received the Premchand-Roychand Scholarship.[4]

Academic career

File:Jadunath Sircar.jpg
c. 1926

In 1893, he was inducted as a faculty member of English literature at Ripon College, Calcutta (later renamed Surendranath College).[4] In 1898, he was appointed to Presidency College, Calcutta, after getting selected in the Provincial Education Services.[4] In between, from 1917 to 1919, he taught modern Indian history at Benaras Hindu University, and from 1919 to 1923, both English and history at Ravenshaw College, Cuttack.[4] In 1923, he became an honorary member of the Royal Asiatic Society of London. In August 1926, he was appointed as the vice-chancellor of Calcutta University. In 1928, he joined as Sir W. Meyer Lecturer in Madras University.

Historiography

Reception

He has been called the "greatest Indian historian of his time" and one of the greatest in the world, whose erudite works "have established a tradition of honest and scholarly historiography" by E. Sreedharan.[5] He has also been compared with Theodor Mommsen and Leopold von Ranke.[5] Arthur Llewellyn Basham calls him "the greatest Indian historian of his generation."[6] He has also been described as "a star historian of modern India on medieval Indian history, who brilliantly caught the spirit of the age and devoted himself to the neglected field of Indian historiography."[7] He has also been appreciated as "unquestionably the greatest Indian historian of his time and one of the greatest in the world".[8]

Sarkar's historiography was inclined towards nationalist elements.[9] His works faded out of public memory with the increasing advent of Marxist and postcolonial schools of historiography.[10]

Academically, Jos J. L. Gommans compares Sarkar's work with those of the Aligarh historians, noting that while the historians from the Aligarh worked mainly on the mansabdari system and gunpowder technology in the Mughal Empire, Sarkar concentrated on military tactics and sieges.[11] In a letter dated 25 November 1945 to historian Dr. Raghubir Sinh of Sitamau, Sarkar says, "Aurangzib is my life's work; Shivaji is only an incidental off-shoot of it."[12]

File:Jadunath sarkar.jpg
Jadunath Sarkar

Honours

In 1904, Sarkar was given the Griffith Prize by the University of Calcutta (Kolkata, Bengal). He was elected as a member of the Indian Historical Records Commission in 1919. In 1923, he was made an Honorary Member of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (Hon. MRAS) and Honorary Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal (Hon. FRASB).[13]

Sarkar was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) in the 1926 New Year Honours[14] and knighted in the 1929 Birthday Honours by King George V, then also Emperor of India.[15] On 22 August 1929, he was invested with his knighthood at Simla by the acting Viceroy of India, George Goschen, 2nd Viscount Goschen.[16]

In 1935, he became a corresponding member of the Royal Historical Society (London, England) and an honorary member of the American Historical Association (Washington, D.C., US). In 1936 he received an honorary D.Litt. degree from the University of Dhaka and in 1944 from the University of Patna. When he reached his eightieth year, he was honoured in 1949 and 1950 by the literary associations Bangiya Sahitya Parishat and the Bangiya Itihas Parishad (both in Kolkata, West Bengal) for his lifetime achievements.[13]

Legacy

The Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, an autonomous research center, has been established in his house, which was donated to the state government by Sarkar's wife. CSSC also houses the Jadunath Bhavan Museum and Resource Centre, a museum-cum-archive of primary sources.[17]

List of works

Published works by Sarkar include:

  • Economics of British India (1900)
  • The India of Aurangzib (1901)
  • Anecdotes of Aurangzib (1912)
  • History of Aurangzib (in 5 volumes), (1912–24)
  • Chaitanya's pilgrimages and teachings, from his contemporary Bengali biography, the Chaitanya-charit-amrita: Madhya-lila (translation from the Bengali original by Krishnadasa Kaviraja, 1913)
  • Shivāji and his times (1919)
  • Studies in Mughal India (1919)[18]
  • Mughal Administration (1920)[18]
  • Nadir Shah in India (1922)
  • Later Mughals by William Irvine (in 2 volumes), (edited by Jadunath Sarkar, 1922)
  • India through the ages (1928)
  • A Short History of Aurangzib (1930)
  • The Fall of the Mughal Empire (in 4 volumes), (1932–38)
  • Studies in Aurangzib's reign (1933)
  • The House of Shivaji (1940)
  • The History of Bengal (in 2 volumes), (1943–1948)
  • Maāsir-i-ʻĀlamgiri: a history of the emperor Aurangzib-ʻl̀amgir (translation from the Persian original by Muḥammad Sāqī Mustaʻidd Khān, 1947)[19]
  • Military History of India (1960)
  • A History of Jaipur, c. 1503–1938 (1984)[20]
  • A History Of Dasnami Naga Sanyasis

References

  1. ↑ Sir Jadunath Sarkar. Encyclopædia Britannica(11 May 2024). Retrieved 28 February 2023.
  2. ↑ The Formation of the Colonial State in India: Scribes, Paper and Taxes, 1760-1860{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}. Taylor & Francis(17 February 2017). ISBN 978-1-134-49429-3
  3. ↑ Development of Social Sciences: A Librarians Companion{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}. K.K. Publications(10 September 2021)
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 Sarkar, Jadunath. Banglapedia(19 March 2015). Retrieved 30 November 2019.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 A Textbook of Historiography, 500 B.C. to A.D. 2000, E. Sreedharan, p. 448
  6. ↑ Basham, A. L. "Sir Jadunath Sarkar, C.I.E." Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, no. 3/4, 1958, pp. 222–24. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25202199 Template:Webarchive. Retrieved 17 Feb. 2024.
  7. ↑ Profile of a Historian: Sir Jadunath Sarkar (1870-1958). Proceedings of the Indian History Congress({Template:Year).
  8. ↑ Sir Jadunath Sarkar{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}
  9. ↑ A Comprehensive History of Modern Bengal, 1700-1950{{#if:Bhattacharya|, Bhattacharya}. Asiatic Society(2020). ISBN 978-93-89901-95-5
  10. ↑ India's Historic Battles: From Alexander the Great to Kargil{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}. Orient Blackswan(2004). ISBN 978-81-7824-109-8
  11. ↑ Mughal Warfare: Indian Frontiers and Highroads to Empire, 1500-1700{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}. Psychology Press(2002). ISBN 978-0-415-23989-9
  12. ↑ Making of a Princely Historian: Letters of Sir J. N. Sarkar to Dr. Raghubir Sinh of Sitamau{{#if:Sarkar|, Sarkar}. Maharashtra State Board for Archives and Archaeology(1975)
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 About Jadunath Sarkar - website of the Jadunath Bhavan Museum of the CSSSC
  14. ↑ Template:London Gazette
  15. ↑ Template:London Gazette
  16. ↑ Template:London Gazette
  17. ↑ In the memory of Jadunath Sarkar. The Telegraph. Retrieved 30 November 2019.
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 Studies in Mughal India by Jadunath Sarkar; Mughal Administration by Jadunath Sarkar. The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland({Template:Date).
  19. ↑ Maāsir-i-'Ālamgīrī of Sāqī Must'ad Khān by Jadunath Sarkar. The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland({Template:Date).
  20. ↑ Jadunath Sarkar: A History of Jaipur, c. 1503-1938. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London({Template:Year).

Sources

  • The Calling of History: Sir Jadunath Sarkar and His Empire of Truth{{#if:Chakrabarty|, Chakrabarty}. University of Chicago Press(2015). ISBN 978-0-226-10044-9

Further reading

  • Sir Jadunath Sarkar Commemoration Volume.{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}. Department of History, Panjab University(1957)
  • Sir Jadunath Sarkar Commemoration Volume.{{#if:|, {{{last}}}}. Department of History, Panjab University(1958)
  • Sir Jadunath Sarkar: A Profile in Historiography{{#if:Pawar|, Pawar}. Books & Books(1985)

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