India will soon tap French historical sources to trace its own history. The Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) has proposed to offer Indian scholars access to “multiple sources” of history to arrive at India’s past, to present it more accurately than before.
“We all know that our history is mostly based on English sources. To get alternative sources on our past is necessary. We should provide our scholars access to such European sources. We already have an ongoing project on translation of Dutch sources on Indian history to English. Now, we plan to add translation of French sources to this project,” Chairperson of the ICHR, Prof. Y.S. Rao told The Hindu .
Prof. Rao, who has earlier stated that India is yet to evolve a methodology to study its remote past with “Indian perspective and is yet to understand the nuances of ancient knowledge,” said the Council will shortly begin special training sessions for history teachers and scholars to help them interpret accurately the epigraphs that have been found in different ancient and medieval languages. This too is being done to uncover facets of ancient and medieval Indian history, which have till now not been recognised.
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The council has been conducting training programmes and workshops for research scholars in historiography and methods, but under the new project, it would organise 21-day training capsules annually for junior scholars and teachers in history to equip them with basics of epigraphy, manuscriptology and numismatics to help them keep abreast with the latest in this field.
“We come across epigraphs in different ancient and medieval languages which need special training to decode in modern parlance to construct history on objective lines. The present generation of scholars need special training in epigraphy,” Prof. Rao said.
Also, on the agenda is a project to trace the development of science in a historical perspective. The ICHR has proposed mapping the journey of science and technology from the earliest times to the 18th century.
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“From about 4th century BC, we come across many scientific texts. The development of Indian sciences had been continuous till our colonial beginnings,” Prof. Rao said.