Dateline Dhulagarh
It may be a while before the truth about Dhulagarh is unravelled as no responsible government would dare to rock…
Time Past and Time Present: Treasures of Human Knowledge at the Asiatic Society, Kolkata, is an exhibition on the history and contributions of the Asiatic Society to the knowledge and study of human civilisation in Asia since 1784, at the IIC, in its Conference Hall I, as part of the IIC Experience 2016. The exhibition includes archival photographs, digitised manuscripts and paintings, letters, documents, books and photographs.
William Jones was one of the earliest among the Orientalists of the East India Company to have arrived in India. About a decade earlier had come Charles Wilkins (1770), Nathaniel Brassey Halhed (1772) and Jonathan Duncan (1772): Warren Hastings' “bright young men”, who had paved the way for the two future institutions Rs The Asiatic Society and the College at Fort William. All the Orientalists, who became famous in history clustered around either the Society or the College or both. The Society, of course, was the pioneer and first in the field.
While others were thinking of individual study and research, Sir William Jones was the first to think in terms of a permanent organisation for Oriental studies and researches on a grand scale in this country. He took the initiative and in January 1784 sent out a circular to selected persons of the elite with a view to establishing such a Society. The Society was formed and in its first meeting, the Governor-General, Warren Hastings, a scholar and patron of learning, was elected its first president and Sir William Jones the vice-president.
The manifesto said, “The bounds of investigations will be the geographical limits of Asia, and within these limits its enquiries will be extended to whatever is performed by MAN or produced by NATURE.” Later, in his famous Third Annual Discourse, Jones emphasised the superiority of Sanskrit as a language: “of a wonderful structure, more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin and more exquisitely refined than either”. When William Jones died in 1794, the Society owned neither any premises nor any funds, but had in its proud possession, an invaluable Asokan rock edict and precious old coins.
The new four-storyed building was formally opened by Dr S Radhakrishnan, the then President of India, on 22 February1965. Membership was first thrown open to Indians in January 1829, among the earliest Indian members being Prasanna Kumar Tagore, Dwarkanath Tagore, Russamay Dutt and Ram Camul Sen. It was not until December 1832 that Radhakanta Deb was invited to become a member. Rajendra Lal Mitra (1822-91) assumed responsibility as the first Indian president of the Society in 1885. It was here that the Indian Renaissance was quietly being made possible.
In 1837 James Prinsep, the new Secretary of the Society, deciphered the Brahmi script and was able to read the Asokan Edicts. It was a world event that revolutionised all future Oriental studies and contributed to the growth of Comparative Philology. The nucleus of the Society's own library was formed soon after the building was completed in 1808. The Fort William College presented books to the Society from its own collection, and another valuable collection of books came from the Palace Library of Tipu Sultan in 1808. The Society's public museum began under its own auspices in 1814. Indeed, the scholarly contributions by the Society were countless and pioneering, and would need a separate chapter, perhaps in the very near future. Suffice it to say till then that the founding fathers of the Asiatic Society were responsible for the rediscovery of India and her past. The exhibition is exhaustive and advisable to visit with time on hand.
By Aruna Bhowmick
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