Archaeology and the Public Purpose

Description

This book interleaves the history of post-Independence archaeology in India with the life and times of Madhusudan Narhar Deshpande (1920–2008), a leading Indian archaeologist who went on to become the director general of the Archaeological Survey of India. Spanning nearly a century, this is a tale told through a main character—Deshpande himself—some of whose writings have been included in the volume. The volume explores the circumstances which brought men like Deshpande to this career path; what it was like to grow up in a family devoted to India’s freedom; the watershed moment that created a large cohort that was trained by Sir R.E. Mortimer Wheeler, the doyen of British archaeology; the unknown conservation stories around the Gol Gumbad in Bijapur and the Qutb Minar in Delhi; the forgotten story of how the fabric of a historic Hindu shrine, the Badrinath temple, was saved; the chemistry shared by the prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and the archaeologist, Deshpande, at the Ajanta and Ellora cave shrines; and the political and administrative challenges faced by director generals of archaeology. The book is a must read for anyone interested in India’s past in general and the history of Indian archaeology in particular.

About the Author 

Nayanjot Lahiri is Professor of History at Ashoka University. Her research interests include Ancient India, Indian archaeology, and heritage studies. She is author of Pre-Ahom Assam (1991), The Archaeology of Indian Trade Routes (upto c. 200 BC) (1992), Finding Forgotten Cities: How the Indus Civilization Was Discovered (2005), Marshalling the Past: Ancient India and its Modern Histories (2012), Ashoka in Ancient India (2015), Monuments Matter: India’s Archaeological Heritage Since Independence (2017), and Time Pieces: A Whistle-Stop Tour of Ancient India (2018). She is co-author of Copper and Its Alloys in Ancient India (1996), editor of The Decline and Fall of the Indus Civilization (2000), co-editor of Ancient India: New Research (2009), Buddhism in Asia: Revival and Reinvention (2016), and an issue of World Archaeology entitled The Archaeology of Hinduism (2004). Nayanjot Lahiri won the Infosys Prize 2013 in the Humanities--Archaeology. Her book Ashoka in Ancient India was awarded the 2016 John F. Richards Prize by the American Historical Association for her book Ashoka in Ancient India.

Table of contents

List of Images and Tables 
Introducing the Book 

PART I ON DESHPANDE 
1. Among Independent India's Young Archaeologists 
2. A Life in Public Archaeology 
3. The Archaeologist and the Prime Minister 
4. Director General Deshpande 
5. The Archaeologist and the Environmentalist 
6. Retirement and After 
References 

PART II BY DESHPANDE 
Early Forays 
1. Krsna Legend in the Jain Canonical Literature 
2. Bahal 1952-3 
Old Sites, New Discoveries 
3. Ellora: Two Copper Coins of the Chola King Rajaraja I 
4. Bhaja: Important Epigraphical Records from the Chaitya Cave 
Cave Shrines: Ajanta, Ellora, Thanala, and Tabo 
5. Ajanta Caves: Their Historical Perspective 
6. A Walk through the Caves of Ellora 
7. Tabo: The Himalayan Ajanta 
8. Buddhist Group of Thanala Caves 
Archaeology, Ethnography, and History 
9. Archaeology's Contribution to History in Recent Times 
10. Some Aspects of Folk Religion in the Konkana and Desh Regions of Maharashtra 
11. The Siva Temple at Bhojpur 
Conserving Monuments: From Gol Gumbaz to Konark 
12. Problems of Conservation of Cultural Property in India 
13. Gol Gumbad, Bijapur 
14. Qutb Minar 
15. Konark Sun Temple Archaeologists and Ascetics 
16. Professor H.D. Sankalia: The Ekalavya of Archaeology 
17. B.K. Thapar: Colleague and Life-Long Friend 
18. A Tribute to the Great Ascetic of Bijapur, Padma Shri Kakasaheb Karkhanis: Centenarian Harijansevak 
19. Gurudev Ranade: A Single Word That Changed My Life! Reaching Out and Looking Back 
20. Monuments and the Child: Experience of an Archaeologist 
21. Unearthing the Past: An Archaeologist's Story 
Index 
About the Author