A doyen of Modern History passes away

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, a file picture.

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, a towering figure in the field of modern history, passed away on January 7 after a year-long battle with cancer. He was 80. Bhattacharya was the chairman of the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) from 2007 to 2011 and chief editor of the Indian Historical Review, ICHR, New Delhi. A former professor of history at Jawaharlal Nehru University (1976-2003) and Vice-Chancellor of Visva Bharati University (1991-1995), he had been the Tagore National Fellow, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, and had also held research and teaching positions at St Antony’s College, Oxford University; University of Chicago; Indian Institute of Management, Kolkata; and El Colegio de Mexico.

Until recently he was the Chairman of the Institute of Development Studies Kolkata and earlier Chairman of the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences Calcutta. He had also served as the Chief Adviser, Rabindra Rachanabali Committee, Bangla Academy.

A prolific writer until the end, Bhattacharya was the author of seminal books on history such as Vande Mataram: The Biography of a Song , Financial Foundations of the British Raj , The Defining Moments in Bengal 1920-1947 , Talking Back: the Idea of Civilization in the Indian Nationalist Discourse , Rabindranath Tagore: An Interpretation , The Mahatma and the Poet: Letters and Debates between Gandhi and Tagore , and, most recently, Archiving the British Raj , which was published by Oxford University Press in 2018.

Even with his failing health he remained active and continued to write for various leading publications, including a popular column, “Campus Crossroads” for Frontline . He had recently completed Comprehensive History of Modern Bengal, 1700-1950 in three volumes in collaboration with 65 renowned historians under the aegis of The Asiatic Society. He was awarded the Rabindra Puraskar in 2011 and a D.Litt from Jadavpur University in 2016.

A Marxist all his life, Sabyasachi Bhattacharya’s gentle, affable nature, his ready wit and his subtle sense of humour won him a large number of admirers not just in academic and literary circles but also among those who came in contact with him.