RSS body to document 5,000 years of state

Vishal Joshi

Tribune News Service

Kurukshetra, February 4

The Akhil Bharatiya Itihaas Sankalan Yojana (ABISY), an RSS-affiliated group of historians, has proposed to document historic details of each Haryana village and town in a bid to ‘connect’ people better with oral and folk traditions.

Dr Balmukund Pande, organising secretary of ABISY, said the project would be undertaken under the aegis of the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) to explore Haryana’s history for the last 5,000 years.

“The ICHR has mooted an ambitious project for which the pilot study will be first done in Haryana. Like most places in India, Haryana’s rich history has not been documented and preserved. The project is important to make future generations aware of the glorious past of the country,” said Pande.

He was here for a conference organised by the Haryana Academy of History and Culture. Denying the charge that rewriting history was aimed at ‘saffronisation’, he said it was ‘course correction’.

Pande claimed that Indian historians first distorted history to please the Mughals and then the British. He said the ABISY was committed to ‘correcting the historic gaps’ through documentation.

“After Independence, a section of Left-leaning historians presented narratives to suit their political ideology. The ABISY wants to trace Indian historiography to write and see history in the right perspective,” he said.

Pande said the ABISY had undertaken a project to prepare an encyclopaedia by studying the Puranas, ancient religious texts, as another part of the historical documentation.

“History is just history and the Puranas are the key source to history in India. Various oral and folk traditions are a part of history, but a section of biased historians chose to ignore it. We will document all such details after validation through scientific protocol,” he said.

Pande said the Haryana Government had undertaken commendable work of exploring the ancient Saraswati river. Only prejudiced scholars had been criticising the move, he claimed.

“The Saraswati ceased to flow centuries ago for certain natural reasons, but it is a part of our oral and traditional practice. Instead of questioning the project, people should value the exploration being done by scientists,” he said.