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Sumit Sarkar

2021-08-21T01:35:48Z

2402:3A80:A9F:8FFC:0:4A:E28C:C801: /* Early Life, Education and career */

{{short description|Indian historian of modern India (born 1939)}}
{{Multiple issues|
{{more footnotes|date=February 2019}}
{{BLP sources|date=February 2019}}}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2020}}
{{Use Indian English|date=May 2018}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Sumit Sarkar
| alma_mater = [[University of Calcutta]]

[[Presidency College, Kolkata|Presidency College]]
}}

'''Sumit Sarkar''' (born 1939) is an Indian historian of modern [[India]]. He is the author of ''Swadeshi Movement''.

==Early Life, Education and career==
He was born to [[Susobhan Sarkar]]. His maternal uncle was [[Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis]].

He completed his BA (Honours) in History at [[Presidency College, Calcutta]] and MA and Ph.D. in the same subject at the [[University of Calcutta]]. He taught for many years as a [[Lecturer]] at the University of Calcutta, and later as a [[Reader (academic rank)|Reader]] at the [[University of Burdwan]]. He was completed his Post-Doctoral Fellowship at [[Wolfson College, Oxford]]. He was [[Professor]] of History at the [[University of Delhi]].<ref>[http://www.upscportal.com/store/author/sumit-sarkar]</ref>

He was one of the founding members of the [[Subaltern Studies|Subaltern Studies Collective]], but later distanced himself from the project. He noted that arguments made by the later issues of the journal as well as books by [[Partha Chatterjee (scholar)|Partha Chatterjee]] in that they blanketly criticized the Enlightenment, the nation-state and secularism lined up with indigenist critiques that were at home with the Hindu right. In his view this error was traceable to a basic confusion in the early project that posed an absolute separation between the elite and subaltern domains.<ref>Sumit Sarkar, "The Decline of the Subaltern in Subaltern Studies," in Writing Social History pp. 82-108</ref>

==Awards==
He was awarded the [[Rabindra Puraskar]] literary award for his book Writing Social History by the [[West Bengal]] government in 2004. He returned the award in 2007 in protest against [[Nandigram violence|the expulsion of farmers]] from their land.<ref>{{cite news |title=Nandigram was more shocking than Jallianwala Bagh |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101207162822/http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1774467.cms |work=[[The Times of India]] |date=2007-03-17 |access-date=2008-03-27 }}</ref>

==Controversy==
He contributed a volume to the ''Towards Freedom'' project of the [[Indian Council of Historical Research]] (ICHR), publication of which was blocked in 2000 by the ICHR under the influence of then Indian government administered by the [[Bharatiya Janata Party]] as alleged by Sarkar.<ref>{{cite news |title= Righting or rewriting Hindu history |url=http://www.atimes.com/ind-pak/BB23Df01.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20000925075754/http://atimes.com/ind-pak/BB23Df01.html |url-status=unfit |archive-date=2000-09-25 |work=[[Asia Times]] |date=2000-02-23 |access-date=2008-03-27 }}</ref> The publication of the volume was eventually allowed by the Government of India once the Congress party came to power after the general election of 2004.<ref>{{cite news |title= 'Towards Freedom' project revived |url=http://www.hindu.com/2004/09/21/stories/2004092115021100.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041114124741/http://www.hindu.com/2004/09/21/stories/2004092115021100.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=2004-11-14 |work=[[The Hindu]] |date=2004-09-21 |access-date=2008-03-27 }}</ref>

==Publications==
* ''Modern Times''
*''Towards Freedom: Documents on the Movement for Independence in India, 1946'', (New Delhi, 2007)
*''Beyond Nationalist Frames: Post-Modernism, Hindu Fundamentalism, History'', (Delhi, 2002)
*''Writing Social History'', (Delhi, 1998)
*''Khaki Shorts and Saffron Flags: A Critique of the Hindu Right'', (with Tapan Basu, Pradip Datta, [[Tanika Sarkar]] and Sambuddha Sen; Orient Longman, 1993). {{ISBN|0863113834}}.
*''Modern India: 1885-1947'', (Basingstoke, 1989)
*''The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, 1903-1908'', (New Delhi, 1973)

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~sj6/SarkarDeclineofSubalternStudies.pdf The Decline of the Subaltern in Subaltern Studies]
* [http://www.friendsofsouthasia.org/textbook/NCERT_Delhi_Historians__Group.pdf "Delhi Historians Group's Publication "Communalization of Education: The History Textbooks Controversy", A report in 2002, New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru University, India].

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sarkar, Sumit}}
[[Category:1939 births]]
[[Category:Presidency University, Kolkata alumni]]
[[Category:University of Calcutta alumni]]
[[Category:University of Calcutta faculty]]
[[Category:University of Burdwan faculty]]
[[Category:University of Delhi faculty]]
[[Category:Jawaharlal Nehru University faculty]]
[[Category:Bengali historians]]
[[Category:Brahmos]]
[[Category:Fellows of Wolfson College, Oxford]]
[[Category:Historians of South Asia]]
[[Category:Historians of colonialism]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian historians]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Indian Marxist historians]]
[[Category:Indian political writers]]
[[Category:Writers about Hindu nationalism]]

Satyendra Prasanna Sinha, 1st Baron Sinha

2021-08-20T05:26:39Z

2402:3A80:A9F:8FFC:0:4A:E28C:C801:

{{short description|Indian politician}}
{{EngvarB|date=April 2020}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2020}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name = The Lord Sinha
| office1 = [[List of Governors of Bihar and Orissa|Governor of Bihar and Orissa]]<ref name = "gov">{{Cite web|url=http://governor.bih.nic.in/OldGovernors.htm|title=Governor of Bihar|website=governor.bih.nic.in|access-date=8 January 2018}}</ref>
| office2 = [[Under-Secretary of State for India]]
| office3 = [[President of the Indian National Congress]]
| honorific-prefix = [[The Right Honourable]]
| honorific-suffix = [[Order of the Star of India|KCSI]], [[His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council|PC]], [[King's Counsel|KC]]
| image = Lord Sina.jpg
| caption = A whole-plate glass negative portrait of Satyendra Prasanna Sinha taken by [[Alexander Bassano|Bassano Ltd]], 20 May 1920, and now in the collection of the [[National Portrait Gallery, London|National Portrait Gallery]], London.
| monarch =
| predecessor1 = Position established
| successor1 = Havilland Le Mesurier (acting)
| predecessor2 = [[John Poynder Dickson, 1st Baron Islington|The Lord Islington]]
| successor2 = [[Victor Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton|The Earl of Lytton]]
| predecessor3 = [[Bhupendra Nath Bose|B.N. Bose]]
| successor3 = [[Ambica Charan Mazumdar]]
| birth_date = {{birth-date|24 March 1863|}}
| birth_place = [[Raipur, Birbhum|Raipur]], [[Bengal Presidency]], [[British India]] (present-day [[Birbhum district]], [[West Bengal]], [[India]])<ref name=SS>{{cite book|last1=Sengupta|first1=Subodh Chandra|last2=Bose|first2=Anjali|title=Samsad Bangali Charitabhidhan (Biographical dictionary)|lang=bn|publisher=Sahitya Samsad|year=1976|place=Calcutta|page=543}}</ref>
| death_date = {{death-date and age|4 March 1928|24 March 1863}}
| death_place = [[Baharampur|Berhampore]], [[Bengal Presidency]], [[British India]] (present-day [[Murshidabad district]], [[West Bengal]], [[India]])
| nationality =
| spouse = {{marriage|Gobinda Mohini Mitter|1880}}
| parents =
| children = 7
| alma_mater =
| occupation = Politician, lawyer
| term_start1 = 29 December 1920<ref name="gov" />
| term_end1 = 30 November 1921<ref name="gov" />
| term_start2 = 1919
| term_end2 = 1920
| term_start3 = 1915
| term_end3 = 1916<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://indianexpress.com/article/india/here-is-a-list-of-past-presidents-of-indian-national-congress-4967084/|title=Indian National Congress: From 1885 till 2017, a brief history of past presidents|date=4 December 2017|work=The Indian Express|access-date=8 January 2018|language=en-US}}</ref>
}}

'''Satyendra Prasanna Sinha, 1st Baron Sinha''',<ref name="gov" /><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/31196/page/2612|title=The London Gazette}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.telegraphindia.com/1140607/jsp/opinion/story_18484855.jsp|title=The language of difference|work=The Telegraph|access-date=8 January 2018}}</ref> [[Order of the Star of India|KCSI]], [[His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council|PC]], [[King's Counsel|KC]], (24 March 1863 – 4 March 1928) was a prominent [[India]]n lawyer and statesman. He was the first Indian [[Advocate-General of Bengal]], first Indian to become a member of the Viceroy's Executive Council and the first Indian to become a member of the British ministry.<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/dadabhai-naoroji-to-nehru-indira-to-sonia-profiles-of-congress-presidents/story-LmoaxHk12wrsFvTubRrFpL.html|title=Dadabhai Naoroji to Nehru; Indira to Sonia: Profiles of Congress presidents|date=20 November 2017|work=Hindustan Times|access-date=8 January 2018|language=en}}</ref> He is sometimes also referred as Satyendra Prasanno Sinha or Satyendra Prasad Sinha.<ref name = "open">{{Cite web|url=http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/s-p-sinha|title=S. P. Sinha {{!}} Making Britain|website=www.open.ac.uk|access-date=8 January 2018}}</ref>

==Early life and education==
Sinha was born on 24 March 1863 in [[Raipur, Birbhum]] in [[Bengal Presidency]], British India (now in [[West Bengal]], [[India]]).<ref name=SS/> His ancestor, Lalchand Dey, a businessman, came from [[Midnapore district|Midnapur]] in southern Bengal to [[Birbhum]] in south-western Bengal, sailing up the Ajoy, to Raipur, which is just south of [[Bolpur]]. Here he set up his new home, buying the zamindari of Raipur from the Chaudhuri of the village. His father, the [[zamindar]] of Raipur, belonged to the [[Bengali Kayastha|Uttar Rarhi Kayastha]] sreni, a [[Bengali Kayastha]] [[caste]].<ref>{{cite book |title=An Indian In The House: The lives and times of the four trailblazers who first brought India to the British Parliament |date=2019 |publisher=Mereo Books |isbn=978-1-86151-490-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fpWDDwAAQBAJ&q=Satyendra+Prasanna+Sinha,+1st+Baron+Sinha+kayastha&pg=PA274 |access-date=4 April 2020 |language=en}}</ref> Sinha completed his early education from Birbhum Zilla School at Suri and then obtained a scholarship to carry on with his higher studies at [[Presidency College, Calcutta]], then affiliated to the [[University of Calcutta]], in 1878. In 1881, he left his studies in India to study law in England. In England, a scholarship of £50 a year for four years enabled him to attend [[Lincoln's Inn]] where he studied Roman Law, Jurisprudence, Constitutional Law and International Law. Later, he also won the Lincoln's Inn scholarship of £100 for three years.<ref name="open" /> In 1886 he returned to Calcutta as a [[barrister]].<ref name="odnb">{{cite ODNB |first=S. V. |last=FitzGerald |title=Sinha, Satyendra Prasanna, first Baron Sinha (1863–1928) |others=revised Raychaudhuri, Tapan |year=2004 |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/36112 |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/36112 |access-date=18 August 2013}} </ref>

==Career==
After returning to India in 1886, Sinha established a successful legal practice in Calcutta. In 1903, Sinha became Standing Counsel to the [[Government of India]] overriding the claims of an English Barrister. He was the first Indian to be appointed as Advocate-General of Bengal in 1905, a post that was confirmed in 1908. His legal practice in 1908 was so lucrative that accepting government's invitation meant a cut in his annual income of £10,000. Sinha's first inclination was to turn down the viceroy's invitation, but [[Muhammad Ali Jinnah|Jinnah]] and [[Gopal Krishna Gokhale|Gokhale]] convinced him to accept the job.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Jinnah of Pakistan|last=Wolpert|first=Stanley|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2013|isbn=978-0-19-577389-7|location=Karachi, Pakistan|pages=30}}</ref> He also became the first Indian to enter the [[Viceroy's Executive Council]] in 1909. He was [[knight]]ed in the [[New Year Honours]] on 1 January 1915. Sinha was elected President of the [[Indian National Congress]] in 1915 at the Bombay session of [[Indian National Congress|Congress]].

In 1917, Sinha returned to England to work as an Assistant for Secretary of State, [[Edwin Samuel Montagu]]. Later, he also worked as a member of the Imperial War Cabinet and Conference along with the [[Bikaner State|Maharaja of Bikaner]], [[Ganga Singh]] following the outbreak of the First World War, and represented India in Europe's Peace Conference in 1919. In the same year, he was made [[Under-Secretary of State for India|Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India]] and also raised to the [[British peerage|peerage]] as [[Baron]] Sinha of Raipur in the [[Presidency of Bengal]]. He became the first [[Indian people|Indian]] member of the British [[House of Lords]], taking his seat in February 1919. He was instrumental in passing of [[Government of India Act, 1919]] through the House of Lords.

He returned to India in 1920 and was appointed as the first governor of the Province of Bihar and Orissa. His term as Governor did not last long and he served on this position for 11 months on grounds of bad health. In 1926, Sinha went back to England and joined the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London but bad health forced him to return to India.<ref name="open" /><ref name = "congress">{{Cite news|url=https://www.inc.in/en/leadership/past-party-president/satyendra-prasanna-sinha|title=Indian National Congress|access-date=8 January 2018}}</ref>

==Indian National Congress==
Sinha was a member of the Indian National Congress from 1896 to 1919 - rising to become its president in 1915 at the Bombay session. He left Congress in 1919 along with other moderate members. At the Calcutta session of the Congress in 1896 - he brought a proposal that no ruler of any Indian State should be deposed without an open judicial trial.<ref name="congress" />

==Shantiniketan==
[[Shantiniketan]] was originally a part of the ancestral ''[[zamindari]]'' of the Sinha family of [[Raipur, Birbhum|Raipur]], [[Birbhum]].<ref>Basak, Tapan Kumar, ''Rabindranath-Santiniketan-Sriniketan (An Introduction)'', p. 2, B.B.Publication</ref> Satyendra Prasad Sinha donated for the construction of ''Sinha Sadan'' with a clock tower and bell. It was in this building that Oxford University conferred its honorary doctorate on the poet, [[Rabindranath Tagore]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Santiniketan |url=https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5495 |website=UNESCO World Heritage Centre |language=en}}</ref>
[[File:Sinha Sadan - 1926 CE - Santiniketan 2014-06-29 5505.JPG|Sinha Sadan - 1926 CE - Santiniketan 2014-06-29 5505|thumb]]
[[File:Doorway - Sinha Sadan - 1926 CE - Santiniketan 2014-06-29 5525.JPG|Doorway - Sinha Sadan - 1926 CE - Santiniketan 2014-06-29 5525|thumb]]

==Death==
Sinha died on 4 March 1928 at [[Baharampur|Berhampore]].

==Personal life==
He was married to Gobinda Mohini Mitter on 15 May 1880 at Mahata, [[Burdwan]], [[Bengal]]. They had four sons and three daughters.<ref name="odnb" />

==Styles==
*1863–1886: Satyendra Prasad Sinha
*1886–1915: Satyendra Prasad Sinha, KC
*1915-10 February 1919: [[Sir]] Satyendra Prasad Sinha, KC
*10–19 February 1919: ''[[The Right Honourable]]'' Sir Satyendra Prasad Sinha, PC, KC
*19 February 1919 – 1920: ''The Right Honourable'' The Lord Sinha, PC, KC
*1920-1921: [[Excellency|His Excellency]] ''The Right Honourable'' The Lord Sinha, PC, KC
*1921–1928: ''The Right Honourable'' The Lord Sinha, KCSI, PC, KC

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*Biographies:
** {{cite book |last=Ali |first=Muhammad Ansar |year=2012 |chapter=Sinha, Lord Satyendra Prasanna |chapter-url=http://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=Sinha,_Lord_Satyendra_Prasanna |editor1-last=Islam |editor1-first=Sirajul |editor1-link=Sirajul Islam |editor2-last=Jamal |editor2-first=Ahmed A. |title=Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh |edition=Second |publisher=[[Asiatic Society of Bangladesh]]}}
*[http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?search=ss&sText=sinha&LinkID=mp56090 Portraits] at the [[National Portrait Gallery (London)|National Portrait Gallery]]

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{{Succession box| title = [[President of the Indian National Congress]] | years = 1915–1916 |before = [[Bhupendra Nath Bose|B.N. Bose]]| after = [[Ambica Charan Mazumdar]]}}
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{{Succession box| title = [[Under-Secretary of State for India]] | years = 1919–1920 | before = [[John Poynder Dickson, 1st Baron Islington|The Lord Islington]] | after = [[Victor Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton|The Earl of Lytton]]}}
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{{Succession box| title=[[List of Governors of Bihar and Orissa|Governor of Bihar and Orissa]] | before=New office ([[Edward Albert Gait|Sir Edward Gait]] as Lieutenant Governor) | after=Havilland Le Mesurier (acting) | years=1920–1921}}
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{{Succession box| title=[[Baron Sinha]] | before= New creation | after=Aroon Kumar Sinha | years=1919–1928 }}
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{{Indian National Congress Presidents}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sinha, Satyendra Prasad}}
[[Category:1863 births]]
[[Category:1928 deaths]]
[[Category:Bengali people]]
[[Category:Bengali Hindus]]
[[Category:Politicians from Kolkata]]
[[Category:West Bengal politicians]]
[[Category:Presidency University, Kolkata alumni]]
[[Category:University of Calcutta alumni]]
[[Category:Barons in the Peerage of the United Kingdom]]
[[Category:Indian peers]]
[[Category:Bengali zamindars]]
[[Category:Indian members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom]]
[[Category:Indian barristers]]
[[Category:Knights Commander of the Order of the Star of India]]
[[Category:Knights Bachelor]]
[[Category:Indian knights]]
[[Category:People from Birbhum district]]
[[Category:Members of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council]]
[[Category:British politicians of Indian descent]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian lawyers]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian lawyers]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian politicians]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian politicians]]
[[Category:English Queen's Counsel]]
[[Category:Peers created by George V]]