02-10-2007, 08:29 AM
<b>Babu at ICHR helm has historians, Left annoyed</b>
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The appointment of a bureaucrat from the HRD Ministry as the chairman of Indian Council for Historical Research (ICHR) has irked the Left historians with the CPI(M) sharing the same concern.
The controversy comes close on the heels of the <b>CPI(M) lambasting the government for not including a "historian worth the name" </b>in the government panel to celebrate the 150 years of First War of Independence. Twenty historians, including Irfan Habib, D N Jha and Arjun Dev, in a statement have flayed the move saying "since such a person (a bureaucrat) is not answerable either to the council or government, he inevitably treats as a personal fief, a situation that is most inimical to the academic activities of the organisation."
"This affects the autonomy of the ICHR and should be resisted," Irfan Habib told The Indian Express. "We share their concern at the appointment of a non-historian as the chairman of the ICHR," said senior CPI(M) leader Nilotpal Basu.
Habib reminds that the ICHR rules "enjoin that the Government of India should appoint an eminent historian to be its chairman".
Following three-year term of D N Tripathi as the chairman came to an end on February 4, K M Acharya, under secretary in the HRD Ministry was appointed as his successor.
While the historians urged the government to appoint a "historian of stature as the chairman", they asked the government to ensure the present chairman should not take any action that "disturbs either the administrative arrangements or the programme undertaken by the council."
<b>Explains Irfan Habib, "the bureaucrat chairman is not answerable to the council or the committees." The historians also point out that the UPA Government was keen to take up corrective actions at the ICHR.
The present government in the CMP had promised to "de-saffronise" government-funded academic institutes and the Human Resource Development Ministry had set up a one-person committee to review the affairs of the ICHR in September 2004. </b>
D Bandyopadhyay, a retired civil servant, was given the mandate to review their administration and functioning between 1998 and 2004, the period when the BJP headed the coalition government at the Centre, and Murli Manohar Joshi was the HRD minister.
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The appointment of a bureaucrat from the HRD Ministry as the chairman of Indian Council for Historical Research (ICHR) has irked the Left historians with the CPI(M) sharing the same concern.
The controversy comes close on the heels of the <b>CPI(M) lambasting the government for not including a "historian worth the name" </b>in the government panel to celebrate the 150 years of First War of Independence. Twenty historians, including Irfan Habib, D N Jha and Arjun Dev, in a statement have flayed the move saying "since such a person (a bureaucrat) is not answerable either to the council or government, he inevitably treats as a personal fief, a situation that is most inimical to the academic activities of the organisation."
"This affects the autonomy of the ICHR and should be resisted," Irfan Habib told The Indian Express. "We share their concern at the appointment of a non-historian as the chairman of the ICHR," said senior CPI(M) leader Nilotpal Basu.
Habib reminds that the ICHR rules "enjoin that the Government of India should appoint an eminent historian to be its chairman".
Following three-year term of D N Tripathi as the chairman came to an end on February 4, K M Acharya, under secretary in the HRD Ministry was appointed as his successor.
While the historians urged the government to appoint a "historian of stature as the chairman", they asked the government to ensure the present chairman should not take any action that "disturbs either the administrative arrangements or the programme undertaken by the council."
<b>Explains Irfan Habib, "the bureaucrat chairman is not answerable to the council or the committees." The historians also point out that the UPA Government was keen to take up corrective actions at the ICHR.
The present government in the CMP had promised to "de-saffronise" government-funded academic institutes and the Human Resource Development Ministry had set up a one-person committee to review the affairs of the ICHR in September 2004. </b>
D Bandyopadhyay, a retired civil servant, was given the mandate to review their administration and functioning between 1998 and 2004, the period when the BJP headed the coalition government at the Centre, and Murli Manohar Joshi was the HRD minister.
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