PROFILE
Akash Bhattacharya
Email: [email protected]
Akash Bhattacharya is a historian and has worked on a range of themes including history of
education and pedagogy in colonial India, colonial vernacular literature, and the politics of
modern history writing. His doctoral research focused on the social origins of Liberal education
in colonial India. He has increasingly taken an interest in policy research in education, especially
its interface with labor policy. An avid follower of Indian politics, he also writes commentaries
on topical issues including social movements, secularism, state repression, and so on, in addition
to the politics of education.
Academic Qualifications
- Ph.D. (History) (Jawaharlal Nehru University) (2018)
- M.Phil. (History) (Jawaharlal Nehru University) (2013)
- M.A. (History) (Jawaharlal Nehru University) (2011)
- B.A. (History) (St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi) (2009)
Courses Taught
- Comparative History of Education
- Political Economy of Education
- Knowledge in Social Studies
- Curricular Material Development in Social Studies
Areas of Interest
History of education and pedagogy, trajectories of Liberal democratic politics in South Asia.
Publications and Writings
Research Articles
- ‘Urbanizing Uttarpara: Philanthropy, Improvement, Education (c.1846 - c.1865)’,
Education and the Urban in India, Working Paper Series, Vol. 10 (2021).
- ‘Pathshalas, Schools and the Advent of Primary Education in Bengal’, in Rethinking
the Local in Indian History: Perspectives from Eastern India edited by Kaustubh
Sengupta and Tista Das (Ranikhet: Permanent Black, 2021). (Forthcoming)
- ‘Pedagogic Limits of the Colonial State: The School Teacher in Colonial Bengal
(c.1854 – c.1905)’, Proceedings of the Indian History Congress 78, (December
2017): 717-725.
- ‘The Past in Vrindavanlal Verma's Present: Writing Historical Fiction in Colonial
India’, Proceedings of the Indian History Congress 73, (December 2013): 961-
966.
Political Commentary
- ‘What the Outsider Discourse in the Anti-CAA Movement Hides’, Newsclick, 8
September 2020.
- ‘Education 2020: Pandemics and Pushbacks, Repression and Resistance’, Groundxero, 7
January 2020.
- ‘The Isolation of JNU’, Groundxero, 1 January 2020.
- ‘The Battles Against Modi: What an Industrial Strike Teaches Us’, Economic and
Political Weekly, Vol. 49, No. 23, 7 June 2014, pp. 15-18.
- The Mandir Masjid Debate in Ayodhya: The Histories that Matter, Arek Rakam 8, no.
17, 1 November 2020
On-going Projects
Book Project, tentatively titled In the Name of the People: The Origins of Public Education in
India
