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Brajendranath De

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Brajendranath De (Bengali: ব্রজেন্দ্রনাথ দে) (23 December, 1852 – 20 September, 1932) (Bengali: ১০ পৌষ, ১২৫৯ - ০৪ আশ্বিন, ১৩৩৯) was an early Indian member of the Indian Civil Service.[1]

Brajendranath De
Born(1852-12-23)23 December 1852
Calcutta, Bengal, British India
Died20 September 1932(1932-09-20) (aged 79) (Bengali: ৮০)
Calcutta, Bengal, British India
OccupationCivil Servant
Years active1873-1910
Spouse(s)Nagendranandini De (Bengali: নগেন্দ্রনন্দিনি দে) (nee Bose) (Bengali: বসু)
Children12

Early life and education

De, a member of a Kayastha-Brahmo family of Calcutta, was born to Durgadas De (দূর্গাদাস দে), an early student of Hindu College, Calcutta (later renamed Presidency University) and Trailokyamohini Debi (ত্রৈলোক্যমোহিনী দেবী). He studied at Hare School, Calcutta, and then Canning Collegiate School and Canning College, Lucknow,[2] where he was a pupil of Saiyid Husain Bilgrami.

Later, he travelled to England for his higher studies, joining University College, London to appear in the Open Competitive Services examination. He joined the ICS in 1873,[3] becoming the 8th Indian member of the steel frame.[4] Subsequently, he was called to the Bar by the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple on 7 June 1875.[5] He was admitted to St. Mary Hall, Oxford, where he spent one year, from 1874-1875, on a Boden Sanskrit Scholarship, attending lectures of Max Mueller and Monier-Williams.[6][7]

His fifth eldest daughter was Saroj Nalini Dutt[4] and his third eldest son was Basanta Kumar De, whose son was Barun De.

Career

He took up his first posting in the civil service as assistant magistrate and collector of Arrah, Behar in 1875. After serving in a number of districts in Behar, he was posted in Raniganj, Bengal in 1881.[8] He officiated as the district magistrate and collector of Bankura, Burdwan and Faridpore. He served as the full district magistrate and collector of Khulna, where he was befriended by Dr. Krishnadhan Ghosh, the civil surgeon of the district, and the father of Aurobindo Ghosh.[9][10] He became the magistrate and collector of Balasore in Orissa and then of Malda and Hooghly.[11] He was the first Indian to be elected as chairman of the Hooghly Municipal Corporation. He was an (acting) commissioner of the Burdwan Division.[12][13]

As the district officer of Hooghly, he started the Duke Club there which was meant to be exclusively for Indians.[14] One of his commissioners once told him not to entertain the thought of wanting to join a British club in the district.[15]

De retired from active service in 1910.

Post-Retirement

After retirement he remained involved in the work of the Calcutta Improvement Trust.[16][17] He served as a vice-president of the council of the Asiatic Society, Calcutta.[18][19]

Academic

De translated Kalidasa's 'Vikramorvasi' and 'Manichudabadana' from Sanskrit to English.[16] He edited an English-Bengali dictionary[13] and published an article on inter dining in the Madras Social Reformer (1910).

He was the translator and editor, in two volumes, of Nizamuddin Ahmad's The Tabaqat-i-Akbari. The third volume, which he had left fully prepared, was posthumously published by Baini Prasad and M. Hidayat Hosain.[20][21][2]

Legacy

A road in Chinsura, the headquarter of Hooghly district[22] and a hall in Malda, the headquarter of Malda district[23] are named after him.

Publications

  • (Ed. & tran.), Kālidāsa's play Vikramorvasi, Canto I., in Calcutta Review, Oct. 1884, pp. 440–2.[24]
  • (Ed. & tran.), The Tabaqat-i-Akbari of Khwaja Nizamuddin Ahmad: A History of India from the Early Musalman Invasions to the Thirty-eighth year of the Reign of Akbar (in 3 Vols.), (Calcutta, reprint, 1973)[25]
  • "Reminiscences of an Indian Member of the Indian Civil Service", in Calcutta Review, (1953–5) (in 3 parts).[26][27]

References

  1. ↑ Indiasaga Who's Who
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Full Text of 'Tabaqat-i-Akbari'
  3. ↑ India Office, Great Britain (1905). The India List and India Office List 1905. Harrison and Sons. p. 447.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Geraldine Forbes, 'Women in Modern India', The New Cambridge History of India, Volume IV.2, (Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 28–29
  5. ↑ Renu Paul (in consultation with Mitra Sharafi), 'South Asians at the Inns of Court: Middle Temple, 1863-1944', compilation based on H. A. C. Sturgess, (eds.) Register of Admissions to the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple. From the Fifteenth Century to the Year 1944 (London: published for the Hon. Society of the Middle Temple by Butterworth & Co., 1949), volumes II (1782-1909) and III (1910-44), p. 2.
  6. ↑ Oxford University Calendar, 1875, p. 366
  7. ↑ Note written by his third eldest son, Basanta Kumar De, on the occasion of his mother's 50th death anniversary in 1969.
  8. ↑ Military and ICS Manual
  9. ↑ Peter Heehs, 'The Lives of Sri Aurobindo', (New York: Columbia University Press, 2008), p. 33
  10. ↑ Government Notifications: Orders by the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, 6 August, 1893, in 'The Liberal and the New Dispensation', Volume XII, Issue 30, Calcutta, R.S. Bhattacharji, p. 9
  11. ↑ "Mr. B. De", in Bengalee, 7 September 1910; see also Indian Daily News, 3 September 1910
  12. ↑ Tapati Dutta Gupta, 'Social Thought of Rabindranath Tagore: A Historical Analysis', Abhinav Publications, p. 122, 1993
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 "Late Mr. B. De.: Passing Away of an Old Civilian" in Liberty, Friday, 30 September 1932
  14. ↑ Mrinalini Sinha, 'Britishness, Clubbability, and the Colonial Public Sphere: The Genealogy of an Imperial Institution in Colonial India', in 'The Journal of British Studies', Volume 4, Issue 44, October 2001, pp. 489–521
  15. ↑ Tony Ballantyne, 'Bodies in Contact', Duke University Press, 2005, p.193
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 'Late Mr. B.De: Passing Away of An Old Civilian' in Liberty, Friday, 30 September 1932
  17. ↑ "Late Mr. B. De, Calcutta Corporation Tributes", in Liberty, Saturday, 1 October 1932
  18. ↑ "Birth Centenary of B.De Celebrated" in The Statesman, Wednesday, 24 December 1952
  19. ↑ "He Rehabilitated Persian in Bengal: Tributes to Late B.De: Birthday Celebration" in Amrita Bazar Patrika, Wednesday, 24 December 1952
  20. ↑ "Mr.B.De Dead Retired Member of the Civil Service" in The Statesman, 30 September 1932
  21. ↑ Sudha Sharma, Status of Muslim Women in Medieval India, Allahabad
  22. ↑ Map of Chinsura, Hooghly, Bengal
  23. ↑ Map of Malda, Bengal
  24. ↑ Schuyler, Jr., Montgomery (1902). "Bibliography of Kālidāsa's Mālavikāgnimitra and Vikramorvaçī". Journal of the American Oriental Society. 23: 93–101. doi:10.2307/592384. JSTOR 592384.
  25. ↑ Tabaqat-i-Akbari by Khwaja Nizamuddin Ahmed
  26. ↑ Reminiscences of an Indian Member of the Indian Civil Service' in the Calcutta Review
  27. ↑ Mrinalini Sinha, "Reconfiguring Hiararchies: The Ilbert Bill Controversy, 1883-84", in Reina Lewis and Sarah Mills, Feminist Post-Colonialist Theory: A Reader, New York and London, Routledge, 2003, p. 456

External links

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