Talk:Gyan Pandey

By Anirudha patel

Prof Gyanendra Pandey is a professor at Emory University. As per his CV , he engages in African-American history, Colonial and postcolonial history, Subaltern studies, South Asia.

In 2021, he endorsed the "Dismantling Global Hindutva" conference and made the allegation

"the current government of India [in 2021] has instituted discriminatory policies including beef bans, restrictions on religious conversion and interfaith weddings, and the introduction of religious discrimination into India’s citizenship laws. The result has been a horrifying rise in religious and caste-based violence, including hate crimes, lynchings, and rapes directed against Muslims, non-conforming Dalits, Sikhs, Christians, adivasis and other dissident Hindus. Women of these communities are especially targeted. Meanwhile, the government has used every tool of harassment and intimidation to muzzle dissent. Dozens of student activists and human rights defenders are currently languishing in jail indefinitely without due process under repressive anti-terrorism laws."

In 2016, he signed a letter addressed to the State Board of Education, California Department of Education, dated May 17, 2016. The letter stated the following:

1. "There is no established connection between Hinduism and the Indus Civilization. The Rg Veda contains numerous mentions of horses and chariots but there is no conclusive material or fossil evidence for either at any Indus valley archeological site."
2. "It is inappropriate to remove mention of the connection of caste to Hinduism."
3. "The geographic location of the Indus Civilization lies in what is now contemporary India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. The use of "South Asia" to describe this shared civilizational heritage is thus entirely appropriate in some places of the framework, even though South Asia is a modern term, and some source materials use the term ‘Ancient India.' "

Publications

Books

1. Pandey, Gyan. A History of Prejudice: Race, Caste, and Difference in India and the United States. Cambridge University Press, New York, 2013.
2. Pandey, Gyan. The Construction of Communalism in Colonial North India. 3rd ed., Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2012. Re-issued by the American Council of Learned Societies History E-Book Project and the ACLS Humanities E-Book Handheld Editions Initiative, 2011, and as an ‘Oxford India Perennial’ to mark the centenary of Oxford University Press, 2012.
3. Pandey, Gyan. The Gyanendra Pandey Omnibus. Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2008. Reprinted 2009.
4. Pandey, Gyan. Routine Violence: Nations, Fragments, Histories. Stanford University Press, series ‘Cultural Memory in the Present’, Stanford, 2006. Also published as first in the new series of ‘Subaltern Studies Monographs’ by Permanent Black, New Delhi, 2006.
5. Pandey, Gyan. The Ascendancy of the Congress in Uttar Pradesh: Class, Community, and Nation in Northern India, 1920-1940. Revised and expanded edition, Anthem Press, London, 2002.
6. Pandey, Gyan. Remembering Partition: Violence, Nationalism, and History in India. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001.
7. Pandey, Gyan. Memory, History, and the Question of Violence. K.P. Bagchi & Co., Calcutta, 1999.

Academic papers

1. Pandey, Gyan. "Language of Democracy/States of Identity." The State of Indian Democracy, edited by Manas Ray, forthcoming, Primus, New Delhi, 2019.
2. Pandey, Gyan. "Hindustani Aadmi Ghar Mein: Tab Aur Ab?" Pratimaan, vol. 6, no. 11, Jan.-June 2018, pp. 1-20,000.
3. Pandey, Gyan. "Interview with Gyanendra Pandey." Summerhill: Indian Institute of Advance Studies Review, vol. XXII, no. 2, Winter 2016.
4. Pandey, Gyan. "Drive for a Monolingual Order: Segregation and Democracy in Our Time." South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 25 Nov. 2016.
5. Pandey, Gyan. "Dreaming in English: Challenges of Nationhood and Democracy." Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 51, no. 16, Apr. 2016,.
6. Pandey, Gyan. "A People’s History of India, 1947-2014." Making Sense of Modi’s ‘New’ India, Harper Collins, London, 2016.
7. Pandey, Gyan. "Racialization of Subaltern Populations: The Politics of Difference." Review of Black Political Economy, vol. 43, no. 2, June 2015.
8. Pandey, Gyan. "The State and the Plantation: Writing Differently." How We Write: Scholarly Writing and the Power of Form, edited by Angelika Bammer and Ruth-Ellen Joeres, Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2015.
9. Pandey, Gyan. "Off-Centered States: An Appreciation." State Theory and Andean Politics: New Approaches to the Study of Rule, edited by Christopher Krupa and David Nugent, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 2015.
10. Pandey, Gyan. "Politics and Democracy in Our Time: Terms of Analysis." Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 50, no. 20, May 2015,
11. Pandey, Gyanendra. “Modes of History Writing: New Hindu History of Ayodhya.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 29, no. 25, 1994, pp. 1523–28.

    The central theme of the article is regarding the History of Ayodhya and its association with Ram. It alleges that Hindu - right wing has promoted an alternative history of Ayodhya and Ram since the past decade.

    Following are th claims and allegations:

    • The author argues that Hindu account of the history of ayodhya has completely transformed. Previously the metaphorical quality of the history was valued more than the literal truth of a particular existence of man/God or the geographical location.
    • He claims that the “new version of history is fundamentally ahistorical” as it allows no change in the character, interests and behaviors of its protagonists. suggesting that History should not be recored as it is done today.
    • He alleges that history claimed and portrayed in terms of Ayodhya is merely a claim as many historians are skeptical about the fact. The varieties of facts have been reinforced by the certainty of faith.
    • Author argues that the number of battles fought for Rama Janma bhumi were 79 but only 77 are represented.
    • He alleges that it's not about the history of the region, not the people of Ayodhya and not even about the spot which is “ now called as Rama Janma Bhumi” but about the building on that spot. He further says that “ everything revolves around the destruction of the monument that was built in that spot”
    • He argues that Rama’s temple was constructed many times, but the new history does not represents the history of temple or Ram Janma bhumi but it focuses more of its destruction and “mosque build upon its ruins” . he says that, “It doesn't talks about Hindus but about muslims or to be more precise the evilness of muslims”
    • He claims that the construction of history is not mentioned in “most versions of hindu history but is simply assumed”
    • Author alleges that Hindu historians glamorized Hindu muslim conflicts and what “were riots, convulsions, symptoms of disease for colonialist writers, are wars for Hindu historians” - Author glamorized colonial writers and prefer them against other writers.
    • Further, Hindu historians looked at muslims as evil, narrow minded and bigoted whereas Hindus were tolerant and accommodating.
    • Author alleges that wars, riots that happened for the liberation of Ram Janma bhumi are merely “for the thrill of turbulence” and “ is a dismal history and merely deserves any name.” - demeaning all the people who died during the riots of Ram janma Bhumi.
    • He alleges that Hindu accounts beliefs in its own pretension to epic status and radically depart from its unidirectionality with the absence of beginning, middle and end.
    • He alleges that Hindu historical accounts does not assign the divine status to muslims as they did with “Ravana stating that he is a small part of infinity seeking his death at the hands of Ram so that he might become one with eternal”
    • He says that in Hindu history, the community is enumerated entities with fixed boundaries from the start. He alleges that the point of Hindu politics and hindu history is to capture state power and it is way far from its claims of - giving voice to the indigenous. Suggesting that the power should be left to the authoritarians and never try to seek justice and excercise any rights.