Sugata Bose: Difference between revisions

| caption            = Dr. Sugata Bose

The grandnephew of [[Indian Independence movement|Indian nationalist]] [[Subhas Chandra Bose]]<ref name="The Hindu"/> and grandson of nationalist [[Sarat Chandra Bose]], Bose is the son of former [[Trinamool Congress]] [[Member of Parliament|parliamentarian]] [[Krishna Bose]] and paediatrician Sisir Kumar Bose.<ref name="reviewit.pk">https://reviewit.pk/indo-pak-weddings/</ref> Bose's brother, [[Sumantra Bose]], teaches at the [[London School of Economics]]; his sister, [[Sarmila Bose]], is a researcher at Oxford University.<ref name=lunch>Anjali Puri, [http://www.business-standard.com/article/opinion/lunch-with-bs-sugata-bose-116030400361_1.html Lunch With BS: Sugata Bose], Business Standard, 4 March 2016.</ref>

In 2011 Bose published ''His Majesty's Opponent: Subhas Chandra Bose and India's Struggle against Empire'', a biography of his great uncle Subhas Bose. The biography, a [[:wikt:trade book|trade book]],{{Sfn|Zachariah|2012|p=109|ps=: Quote: "Sugata Bose's biographical tribute to his great-uncle, the Indian nationalist politician Subhas Chandra Bose (1897–1945) is a gripping tale of a life of anti-colonial struggle and of a quiet, religiously oriented individual who spent much of his adult life in prison or in exile, tormented by his colonial overlords, becoming a politician, a warrior, and a legend and inspiration to some after his death. ...  As a trade book, it also eschews some of the scholarly paraphernalia that enable a more critical engagement with its contents.  Academic circles have long had in Leonard Gordon's ''Brothers against the Raj: A Biography of Indian Nationalists Sarat and Subhas Chandra Bose'' (1990) a careful and detailed account of the lives of Subhas Bose and his elder brother Sarat.  Sugata Bose's book is not likely to replace Gordon's account."}} has been criticised in scholarly reviews for soft-pedaling or oversimplifying Subhas Chandra Bose's alliances with Italian Fascism, German [[Nazi Germany|National Socialism]], and Japanese [[imperialism]].{{Sfn|Framke|2012|p=365|ps=: Quote: "While one can only highly recommend this book as a fine introduction to readers interested in the history of the national independence movement in the first half of the 20th century, in regard to Bose's encounters and interactions with National Socialism and Fascism, the monograph does not provide important new insights. ... Not only this episode, but also several others are interpreted by Sugata Bose in a rather unambiguous way that strongly rejects all possible affinities of Subhas Chandra Bose towards Fascism and National Socialism. In doing so, the author in my understanding, presents a relatively simplistic account of a much complex nature of engagement which Bose nurtured with international and national ideological contexts."}}{{Sfn|Zachariah|2012|pp=109–110|ps=: Quote: "The fact that he (Subhas Bose) considered himself a socialist, often expressed his displeasure or disagreement with aspects of the Italian or German dictatorships or with Japanese imperialism, and had Jewish friends in Germany and Austria, or that he wrote in his autobiography of the need for a "synthesis" between socialism and fascism, is not a substitute for a more nuanced intellectual history that engages seriously with what these ideologies were."}}  The book has also been criticised for its optimistic speculations on what Subhas Bose might have accomplished had he lived.{{Sfn|Wainwright|2013|p=361|ps=: Quote: "Less certain are some of the author’s speculations regarding how Bose’s presence in India after the Allied victory might have affected the partition and political culture of the subcontinent."}} Some popular reviews have been more positive.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Bhattacharya|first=Sabyasachi|journal=Biblio|year=2011|title=Review|url=http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674047549&content=reviews|access-date=30 October 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=Mukherjee|first=Rudrangshu|title=A Hero's Story|url=http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110729/jsp/opinion/story_14301827.jsp|work=The Telegraph|access-date=23 March 2014|location=Calcutta, India|date=29 July 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Malik|first=Ashok|title=Son of the Nation|url=http://www.hindustantimes.com/lifestyle/books/son-of-the-nation/article1-729878.aspx|work=The Hindustan Times|access-date=23 March 2014|date=5 August 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140323194243/http://www.hindustantimes.com/lifestyle/books/son-of-the-nation/article1-729878.aspx|archive-date=23 March 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Motadel|first=David|title=India's Enemy's Enemy|journal=The Times Literary Supplement|date=24 February 2012}}</ref>

In his earlier ''A Hundred Horizons: The Indian Ocean in the Age of Global Empire'' (2006), Bose attempts to challenge the thesis pioneered by [[Kirti N. Chaudhuri]] in {{citation|title=Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean: An Economic History from the Rise of Islam to 1750|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ByT1l36ZxGoC|year=1985|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=9780521285421}} and developed by Andre Wink and others, which holds that the world's first "global economy," the trans-Indian-ocean maritime economy—whose trade was assisted by the alternating winds and currents of the monsoons and which arose in the wake of the spread of Islam—was in turn undercut by European capitalism in the early 18th century.{{Sfn|Campbell|2007|pp=1040–1041}} Instead, Bose contends, in the main thesis of his book, an inter-regional economy of middle-level bazaar merchants and traders continued well into the late 1920s, existing between the dominant European capitalists at the top and the peasants and peddlers at the bottom.{{Sfn|Campbell|2007|pp=1040–1041}} This according to Bose, was not just the case in the market of goods and services, but also in the barter of ideas and culture.{{Sfn|Campbell|2007|pp=1040–1041}} Attempting to bolster the latter notion are sections in the book on [[Mahatma Gandhi|Mohandas K. Gandhi]], [[Rabindranath Tagore]], and Bose's great uncle [[Subhas Chandra Bose]].{{Sfn|Campbell|2007|pp=1040–1041}} ''A Hundred Horizons'' was praised by academic reviewers for explicating the transformations to networks which linked Indian Ocean societies, beyond the influence of colonial empires,<ref>{{cite journal | last = Chatterjee | first = Kumkum | title = Review: A Hundred Horizons: The Indian Ocean in the Age of Global Empire by Sugata Bose | journal = Journal of Interdisciplinary History | volume = 38 | issue = 3 | pages = 499–500 | date = Winter 2008 | doi=10.1162/jinh.2008.38.3.499 | jstor=20143696| s2cid = 142930849 }}</ref> and for exploring "cosmopolitan notions of anticolonialism" throughout the Indian Ocean world.<ref>{{cite journal | last = Bertz | first = Ned | title = Review: A Hundred Horizons: The Indian Ocean in the Age of Global Empire by Sugata Bose | journal = Journal of World History | volume = 18 | issue = 3 | pages = 377–379 | date = September 2007 | doi=10.1353/jwh.2007.0018| s2cid = 162274034 }}</ref> However, Bose's delineation of that economy has been criticised for not going much beyond India and Indians,{{Sfn|Campbell|2007|p=1141a|ps=: Quote: "Thus Bose promises the reader an exposé of the continuity into the modern era of an ancient and sophisticated maritime system of long-distance exchange. ... If only that promise were upheld. Instead, we are treated to what increasingly, chapter by chapter, becomes a nationalist Indian version of Indian Ocean history. The key actors are all Indian and the only country in the region that counts is India."}}{{Sfn|Bertz|2007|p=378|ps=:  The method employed here is to sketch the histories of the "circular migrants" listed above, centring their encounters with the Indian Ocean as the backdrop. However, one can see the challenge in trying to hold these stories together within a single ambitious book. ... A surprisingly narrow aspect of the text is that its main actors are almost universally male and nearly all Indian.}} for reducing the complex exchange between the British and India to a clash of Indian nationalism and British authoritarianism;{{Sfn|Campbell|2007|p=1141b|ps=: Quote:"Of far greater significance for Bose arc the British—and not for establishing the Pax Britannica in the region that permitted the expansion of the Indian trading network. Rather, Bose summons up a caricature of the unrelenting coloniser and oppressor against whose narrow racist and capitalist vision he pits the liberating universalism and profound antimaterialism of Indians."}} and for not providing sufficient warrant for the main thesis in the book.{{Sfn|Campbell|p=1141c|ps=: Quote: "In sum, this is a curious book. A historical and literary dance through the history of rising Indian nationalist sentiment against British imperial rule, it appears aimed more for domestic Indian nationalist consumption than for scholars of the Indian Ocean world. In it, Bose grossly underestimates the complexities of the British imperial presence, and the many divisions along ethnic, caste, religious, economic, and political lines that existed among Indians, at home and overseas. More importantly, his concern with the Indian nationalist cause leads Bose increasingly to lose sight of his initial thesis and the wider enduring rhythms of trans-Indian Ocean world exchange."}}

Beyond his work at Harvard and Tufts, Bose has helped steer two major projects advancing higher education in India. Since 2007, Bose has been a member of the [[Government of India]]'s Nalanda Mentor Group, which seeks to establish an [[Nalanda International University|international university]] on the site of the ancient [[Nalanda|University of Nalanda]] in Bihar. Since 2011, Bose has served as chairman of the [[Presidency University, Kolkata|Presidency College]] Mentor Group, which seeks to revitalise the 194-year-old Kolkata college.<ref>{{cite news | last = Dasgupta | first = Partha | title=Old boys to the rescue | url= http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/presidency-college-mentor-group/1/144999.html | work= India Today | date = 16 July 2011 |access-date= 30 October 2014 }}</ref> He also served on the Social Sciences jury for the [[Infosys Prize]] in 2009, and the Humanities jury in 2015 and 2016.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Humanities Jury|first=Infosys Science Foundation|title=Infosys Prize - Jury 2016|url=https://www.infosys-science-foundation.com/prize/jury/jury-2016.asp#Humanities}}</ref>

* {{cite book | last1 = Bose | first1 = Subhas Chandra (author) | last2 = Bose | first2 = Sugata (editor) | last3 = Bose | first3 = Sisir K. (editor) | author-link1 = Subhas Chandra Bose | author-link3 = Sisir K. Bose | title = The essential writings of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose | publisher = [[Oxford University Press]] | location = Delhi | year = 1997 | isbn = 9780195648546 }}

* {{Citation | last = Bose | first = Sugata | contribution = Pondering poverty, fighting famines: towards a new history of economic ideas | editor-last1 = Kanbur | editor-first1 = Ravi | editor-last2 = Basu | editor-first2 = Kaushik | editor-link1= Ravi Kanbur | editor-link2 = Kaushik Basu | title = Arguments for a better world: essays in honor of Amartya Sen &#124; Volume II: Society, institutions and development | pages = 425–435 | publisher = Oxford University Press | location = Oxford New York | year = 2009 | isbn = 9780199239979 | postscript = .}}