History

Remembering and honoring Vidyasagar Haimanti Banerjee   The 19th century was a very important one among so many before that because it gifted the world with innumerable great personalities from Bharat, particularly from Bengal. To take a few names: Bharat Pathik, a great social reformer; Raja Ram Mohan Roy, a giant spiritual leader; Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa and his disciple Vivekananda; Rishi Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, a genius and a pioneering scientist; Jagadish Chandra Basu, Kobiguru Rabindranath Thakur, Acharya Prafulla Chandra Roy, CV Raman, Srinivasa Ramanujam and so many others in and outside of Bengal who will be remembered as stalwarts in ...

Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose is such a legendary figure in modern Indian history that 120 years after his birth millions around the world wish that he was still alive. While majority feel like he did not die during a plane crash on August 18,1945 in Taiwan, what happened to him if he lived after that day remains a great mystery. Author and journalist Anuj Dhar has been researching this for many years and has documented many unknown sources in an effort to re-establish the fact that not only he did not die in that so-called plane crash, but also he ...

Boston and Bharat In the late 1700s and early 1800s, ships from Boston and nearby Salem used to sail up and down the Atlantic, mostly with Ice blocks. These were preserved using saw-dusts and missionaries went to preach to the ‘heathens’ of Bharat, that is India. In those hay days of British colonialism, many exotic items including tea, spices, and artifacts filled the ships in the return journey. The city of Boston and the surroundings in the state of Massachusetts have much historical imprints both for the Americans and the Indians. First of all, the American Revolution took birth here. The Boston ...

One wonders why Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave so much importance to declassify the files related to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. In the manner and swiftness the files are released on-line is indicative of high importance of the subject matter. Journalist turned researcher Anuj Dhar has written the most well-known books concerning the controversy surrounding the fate of Subhas Chandra Bose. India’s Biggest Cover-up (2012), Vitasta Publishing and latest one is What Happened to Netaji (2016), by the same publisher. He is a co-founder of a group called ‘Mission Netaji’. I had not read the books earlier – only watched videos ...

A very unique event took place in New York on October 1st called the 6th Indian Subcontinent Partition Documentation Project Inc. (ISPaD). Before we present the specifics of this conference, we need to dig history little bit. India was trifurcated in 1947 into India, West Pakistan and East Pakistan. Britain left India but they left a severely divided sub-continent which has thousands of years of shared history. The carnage, mass killings and exodus of people from their homes has no parallel in history. The partition was announced without having any proper plan for people to migrate out/in and as a ...

  Shahriar Kabir is a Bangladeshi journalist, filmmaker, human rights activist and author of more than 70 books focusing on human rights, communism, fundamentalism, history, juvenile and the Bangladesh war of independence. ...

Yes, terrorism in our modern era has arrived on September 11, 2001. I still remember the days at the airport.  I did not have to take off my shoes or belt. I could carry water bottles with me. I still remember the days when we did not have to go through security scans, while entering a government building, bus terminals and hotels. For some time, I’m thinking about violence and war. Is it really inevitable? Our beliefs motivate us to do things. Is it to establish the power of ego – that only my way is right, that the only ...

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By Mayank Shekhar In the general elections of 2014, India renewed its promise of development in the new government. India has made some headway in the last two decades from its positioning as a ‘third world’ country to a developing nation, even though it got its independence 68 years ago after a millennium under invasions and colonial rules. The people of India expect development to be on a fast track in the current Govt.’s tenure. As is typical, the expectations are high and patience very short. At the same time, the opposition and the media together are creating diversions one ...

By Bhaskar Chakravorti Ten years ago, moving to Sudan brought up appalling Western media images of a country ravaged by war, extreme heat and dust, and primitive in its development. And then came the surprise. After an initial period of settling in, looking for fellow Indians and foods and spices, I learned that this country, in which I would spend the next ten years, was very different from the images that were projected of it. I learned of ancient historical trade ties of spice, gold and silk between the Meroe kingdom and Indian traders who used the Red Sea as ...