M. G. S. Narayanan

Muttayil Govindamenon Sankara Narayanan, commonly known as M. G. S. Narayanan (born 20 August 1932) is an Indian historian, academic and political commentator. He headed the Department of History at Calicut University (Kerala) from 1976 to 1990. and served as the Chairman (2001–03) of the Indian Council of Historical Research.

Quotes

 * The most important assumption was that Indian history was just a collection of unrelated events, like a series of migrations and conquests, owing their origin to external stimuli. It did not reveal the organic growth of a nation or a civilization, marking the stages of development or decline. The people are not an active force bringing about changes like the renaissance and reformation, or producing a revolution at some stage. It was a procession of exotic and colourful characters, autocratic kings and emperors just having their way without encountering resistance from the people. ...a long series of invasions…[acted] upon the unresponsive masses [and] political and historical upheavals [were] not products of conditions within society, representing certain trends or movements among the people. […] It was as though India was simply a geographical entity, providing an empty stage for odd characters to appear and move about for some time before their mysterious disappearance.
 * Narayanan, M.G.S., Chairman, Indian Council for Historical Research, The Eurocentric Approach to Indian History in Colonial and Communist Writing: the Case for Reinterpretation November 2001, New Delhi, text of speech available at: http://ifihhome.tripod.com/articles/mgs001.html, quoted from    Rosser, Yvette Claire (2003). Curriculum as Destiny: Forging National Identity in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh . University of Texas at Austin.


 * The resistance to a reevaluation of history is tenacious. As Prof. M. S. G. Narayanan, chairman of the Indian Counsel for Historical Research (ICHR), wrote, “History is constantly rewritten by historians in every country in every age”. He adds that “it is only natural that the intellectual and cultural hegemony of the colonial masters must be terminated, at least after half a century of political independence”. He points out that in colonial historical paradigms, *There was a general tendency to condemn and denigrate everything Indian, calling it Hindu and communal, without realizing the fact that the label ‘Hindu’ did not represent a religion in the Semitic or Western sense, but a whole civilization which possessed institutions and outlook entirely different from those of the Western civilization. [….] Western standards, capitalist or communist, were applied indiscriminately to Indian history for evaluating the developments in all walks of life. This was evident in the way terms like religion, state, class, empire, nation, law,justice, morality, etc. were used in the analysis and interpretation of the past in India.
 * Narayanan, M. G. S. Eurocentric History vs. the Indian Perspective, Chairman’s Column, ICHR Newsletter, Vol. 2, January-June 2002,, quoted from    Rosser, Yvette Claire (2003). Curriculum as Destiny: Forging National Identity in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh . University of Texas at Austin.


 * Referring to the standard “history of different political units” in India, Narayanan asserts that they have been “discussed as though they were kingdoms established arbitrarily by some powerful tyrants and functioning arbitrarily without reference to a framework of civilization”. He blames this on a Euro- centric paradigm, that used, “European and West Asian parallels of religious persecution, conversion, state religion, church-state conflicts etc […] while approaching all Indian phenomena”. About the historiography of medieval India, Narayanan concurs that Hindus have been depopulated from the historical record, and Hinduism has been denuded of its vitality,
 * Narayanan, M. G. S. Eurocentric History vs. the Indian Perspective, Chairman’s Column, ICHR Newsletter, Vol. 2, January-June 2002, quoted from    Rosser, Yvette Claire (2003). Curriculum as Destiny: Forging National Identity in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh . University of Texas at Austin., quoted from     Rosser, Yvette Claire (2003). Curriculum as Destiny: Forging National Identity in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh . University of Texas at Austin.


 * The history of India for the period after Harsha was often conceived as the history of the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Empire. Society outside these was neglected as if it was of no consequence. The history of the regions of North East India and South India was often kept out of what came to be regarded as the mainstream history of India. The process of development of the Indian civilization, its formation and dissemination, and the stages of its growth were not subject matter to be considered in history courses taught in schools and colleges.
 * Narayanan, M. G. S. Eurocentric History vs. the Indian Perspective, Chairman’s Column, ICHR Newsletter, Vol. 2, January-June 2002,, quoted from    Rosser, Yvette Claire (2003). Curriculum as Destiny: Forging National Identity in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh . University of Texas at Austin.


 * We are aware of the fact that certain historians professing to project the Marxist ideology have been in the habit of claiming infallibility and monopoly of wisdom, branding all other historians as reactionary and communal and treating them as untouchables. This intellectual fascism has to be discouraged. What they were enjoying for some time was not a monopoly of wisdom but a monopoly of power in several government bodies and universities. This has come to an end happily. Historical research must now gather new momentum in this country so that our people are eventually liberated from the hegemony of Eurocentric history and enabled to develop their own independent Indian perspective.
 * Narayanan, M. G. S. Eurocentric History vs. the Indian Perspective, Chairman’s Column, ICHR Newsletter, Vol. 2, January-June 2002,, quoted from    Rosser, Yvette Claire (2003). Curriculum as Destiny: Forging National Identity in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh . University of Texas at Austin.