Welcome address by Dr Arvind Gupta, Director VIF during the discussion and release of 'Archaeologist of Independent India Major Personalities and Their Work'

Prof Dilip Chakrabarti Ji,

Prof Kishore Kumar Basa, Chairman of the National Monuments Authority.

Friends,

It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to today’s function being organised to release the book 'Archaeologists of Independent India Major Personalities and Their Work' authored by Prof Dilip K Chakrabarti.

Prof Dilip Chakrabarti is not new to the audience. Last year, we had the pleasure of releasing the remaining volumes of the VIF History of Ancient India series which he had edited. Prof Chakrabarti is an Emeritus Professor of South Asian Archaeology in the Department of Archaeology at Cambridge University. A leading archaeologist of India, he was awarded Padam Shri in 2019. He has held tenured appointments in Calcutta (1965-1977), Delhi (1977-90) and Visva Bharati (1980-81) Universities and several visiting fellowships and teaching appointments in different countries. He has conducted archaeological surveys in Kangra Valley and Chhota Nagpur plateau, Ganga-Yamuna plain, Haryana and Punjab area and worked on the routes connecting the Ganga Valley with Deccan. He has authored and co-authored over 30 books.

Prof Chakrabarti’s latest book 'Archaeologists of Independent India Major Personalities and Their Work' deals with 250 leading personalities in the field and describes their work. The book presents a survey of the archaeological work done in Independent India. In the process, the book serves as a performance audit of the work of the archaeological survey of India, universities and state institutions connected with archaeology and numerous other institutions connected with archaeological science. In a frank and candid appraisal of the field of archaeology in India, the author feels that the performance of Indian archaeology has been below par. He feels that Indian archaeology continues to remain a mere “minor underling” of Western archaeology. Today we will hear from him why he feels so and what should be done to rectify the situation. He states emphatically that the money spent on archaeology and education should bolster the sense of national pride, national identity and unity. This has not been happening in India and there are “certain adverse factors undermining archaeology as a tool of national solidarity and integration” at play.

We are very happy that Prof Kishor Kumar Basa has also joined us today for this discussion. He will comment on the book. Prof Basa is the Chairman of the National Monument Authority of India and the Indian National Confederation and academy of anthropology. He is a former director of Anthropological Survey of India, excavated an archaeological site at Hari Rajpur in Odisha in 2012-13, discovered three skeletons of Neolithic-chalcolithic period, taught archaeological anthropology and museum studies since 1980.

The book is candid and frank but it serves to start a debate in the public as to what has been the Indian archaeology’s contribution to discovering India’s past and building the nation.

I request Prof Chakrabarti to take the floor.