History’s ‘exaggerations’ must go: ICHR chief

New Delhi: The debate in the country on rewriting history is unnecessary as certain “exaggerations” need to be removed from time to time, Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) chairman Arvind Jamkhedkar has said.

The historian also said that the mandate of the ICHR, a body under the human resource development ministry, was not to dictate history or decide curriculum but to encourage research to facilitate the rewriting of history.

“Rewriting is part of the writing of history,” he said, stating that it was a “healthy” trend.

“Over a period of time, a certain awareness comes among historians and they find certain lacunae which would have been left by previous schools,” he said.

“History has always been rewritten and it is a healthy thing because there have been exaggerations. For instance, it was thought that probably the earlier economic historians might have exaggerated a few things and history was then rewritten,” he said.

Mr Jamkhedkar, 78, took over as ICHR chief last month replacing Y.S. Sudershan Rao, who had demitted office in June last year. The Maharashtra-based historian, indologist and archaeologist is also the chancellor of Deccan College, Pune.

After he took charge, the council organised a conference on “Indian History: Emerging perspectives”, seeking to clear “distortions” in Indian history.

Asked about the debate in the country over revisions of history curricula, the chairman said, “It is not ICHR’s mandate to dictate history or decide what should be taught. Its job is to encourage scholars to conduct fresh and meaningful research to rewrite history.”