When Yellapragada Sudershan Rao, chairperson of the Indian Council of Historical Research, decided >last week to do away with the 22-member advisory board to the Indian Historical Review , the ICHR journal, the decision took not only the ousted members — who had not been informed of the move — but also the fraternity of historians by surprise. There are six members on the editorial board, and 12 members of the Council have been asked now to double up as advisory board members. The members of the advisory board, who were not members of the Council, worked purely in an advisory capacity. Their presence served as a guiding force for the journal’s editors: they made use of their stature and standing to attract names to the peer-reviewed journal that had been in the dumps for a decade. The journal turned the corner last year as Sage, the publishers, started paying a royalty from sales to the ICHR. The scrapping of the advisory board raises some fundamental questions on the direction that the respected journal will now take. The question that many historians are asking today then on the functioning structures of the ICHR is this: if it ain’t broke, why fix it?
Interestingly, when he was appointed to the post a year ago by the Bharatiya Janata Party government, Professor Sudershan Rao had said: “According to our traditional knowledge, none of us is all alone in this world and... ours is not a lone planet as is often commented in the Western intellectual circles. Our ancient Indian historical tradition says that we have a number of Lokas and Bhuvanas where infinite number of Jivas exist and are passing through various stages of evolution — physical, intellectual and spiritual. So, passing on this fund of historical knowledge to the coming generations becomes an onerous responsibility of the ICHR, in my view.” Professor Sudershan Rao as a historian — although there are many in the field who question his very credentials to be called one — must put this theory to test before he undertakes to pass it on to future generations. To be accepted as history, the epics, vedas and the puranas have to face the rigour of research and scientific examination: merely developing a fawning attachment or lavishing praise on them would not do. This rigour, as historians will tell you, is a matter of training, and of scholarly competence — not to be confused with a Right way or a Left way. It is with this perspective that the Indian Historical Review will be seen by scholars. Home Minister Rajnath Singh has meanwhile asked historians to read authors such as V.S. Naipaul to take corrective steps in the writing of history, thus seeing no difference between writers and historians. But historians should spot the difference.
