Colonial Rule

The social historiography of the Tezpur Lunatic Asylum can bring interesting new dimensions and debates to critically enquire the history of psychiatry and medicine under colonialism. From the colonial medical records, the article refers to the notion of “madness” and its variants. It emphasises on the social history of the TLA, which occupies a space between knowledge and power under colonial domination. It also critiques the power relations, while categorising the “insane” and bureaucratic involvement during such report writing processes.

A biographer of Bhagat Singh and a chronicler of his works, writes about the publication history of Bhagat Singh’s “Jail Notebook”. This article is being published, when reports have talked about the possible release of the Notebook “for the first time” by the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. 

Bhagat Singh's life (September 28, 1907-March 23, 1931), work and thought were marked by an uncompromising struggle against colonialism and imperialism, together with radical opposition to capitalism, communalism and the caste system. This article is a spirited account of his life, his revolutionary activity, his ideals, his opinions and his legacy. It was on April 8, 1929 that Bhagat Singh and B K Dutt threw non-lethal bombs in the Central Assembly with a view "to make the deaf hear", and raised the slogans "Inquilab Zindabad" and "Down with Imperialism", which caught the imagination of the Indian people. Perhaps at no other point in the life of India since 1947 has the reference to these two slogans become more important than today, as the country marks the hundredth birth anniversary of Bhagat Singh.

The contradictory engagement with mdoernity by the lower castes has an important message: being one step outside modernity alone can guarantee them a public where the politics of difference can articulate itself, and caste can emerge as a legitimate category of democratic politics. Being one step outside modernity is indeed being one step ahead of modernity.

The decade of the 1870s was marked across Bengal by drastic rainfall variations, changing crop patterns and a devastating malarial epidemic that depopulated many villages. Though hampered by a paucity of data, this paper relying on contemporary records establishes the link between widespread incidence of malaria to not merely the declining water supply, but the increasing inaccessibility to existing water sources, thanks to the large-scale construction of embankments and the colonial reclamation of land.