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We should conclude our discussion of Bankim Chandra's views on history with a passing glance at his original researches on the early history of Bengal. Bankim was deeply interested in understanding the Bengali mind and the nature of Bengali cultures and civilization.

In an extended essay' The Origin of the Bengali' Bankim seeks to prove that modern Bengali society is composed of the Kols who came first in Bengal, the Dravidians who came next and the Aryans who came last. But these three streams did not mingle freely and have preserved their separate identities. The British nation have been created out of a fusion of Teutons, Danes and Normans. But they have blended perfectly in course of history, the Bengalis have not. In his opinion there are four types of Bengalis: the Aryans, the Non-Aryan, the Hindus of mixed Aryan and non- Aryan origin and Bengali Muslims. The four sections have separate identities and lead separate lives. The history of Bengal is not the history of an Aryan society.

Bankim Chandra attached great importance to historiography. He thought if a nation remembers its glorious past it strives to regain its glory even when it is in decline. Bankim profoundly longed for Bengal's historical memory. He found that the Bengalis of his time were weak, lacking in character and achievement. But Bengal had a glorious past and were capable of glorious future. Europe was a continent of barbarians up to the fifteenth century. Their rediscovery of the Greek civilization led to their unprecedented prosperity.

In this context Bankim refers to the Bengal's renaissance of the sixteenth century. The impact of Sri Chaitanya and his disciples in religion, Raghunath in logic and philosophy, Raghunandan in legal sciences and the Vaishnava literature which contains lyrics of incomparable beauty brought about this resurgence of Bengali culture.

Bankim Chandra was absolutely sceptical of the anecdotes about Bengali military debacles. The Muslims initially conquerred only a small part of Western Bengal. Bengali kings continued to rule the rest of Bengali-speaking population for a long time. The feudal Hindu and Bangali kings carried on administration under the suzarainty of the Pathan and Mughal chiefs. Bengal was brought under a totally alien rule only during the regime of Warren Hastings late in the eighteenth century. The economic conditions declined in Bengal during the Mughal rule, because of the drain of wealth towards Delhi. During the pre-Mughal Muslim rule, the rulers stayed in Bengal. In Bankim Chandra's opinion, the most fundamental question in Bengal's social history is why the Bengali-speaking population converted to Islam. He considered it to be a major failure of the leadership of Bengali Hindus.

Bankim explicitly argues that the British did not conquer Bengal through superior military might, but through conspiracy, subterfuge and cunning. The superiority of the British was born of their nationalist spirit which the people of Bengal, both Hindus and Muslims, lacked. Even the Muslim conquest of Bengal in the thirteenth century did not reflect on the manhood of Bengal, because the cream of Bengal, the higher castes of Aryan origin had initially migrated to Bengal and their numbers were precariously low when the Muslims came.

Bankim Chandra was an ardent student of history and tried to understand Bengal's historic developments not as a detached. academic bent on a disinterested pursuit of trufli, but as an intellectual leader bent on a mis^on of rejuvenation of Bengali society. He had an agenda—not hidden, but open. Against mis background his was an inspired performance. He would not want historians to falsify facts. He had nothing to fear from facts. He wanted the historical facts to be discovered and digested in order to equip the Bengali mind with a historical memory. He wanted to spur Bengalis to greater achievements to equal those of the British rulers.

Bankim Chandra was not foolish and did not believe that the prosperity of Bengal can be brought about through the prosperity of the higher classes. Being a realist he believed that merely by sending the 66 million Bengalis of his time to school to learn literature, grammar and geometry, moral regeneration of Bengal can be achieved. In any case education imparted through the English language can not reach the masses. Mass education depends on the realization by the educated of its responsibility to love the illiterate and the poor and understand their plight. Social interaction between the economically and educationally divided classes is absolutely essential if the masses are to be uplifted. If is interesting to note that when Bankim Chandra was teaching this in the seventies of the nineteenth century, Mathew Arnold was teaching the British through his lecture on "Equality" that it was inequality which was brutalisingthemasses. Bankim even criticises Ram Mohun for not seeing that the education is to be carried to the masses through the mother-tongue and the educated must write and lecture inBengali, however prestigious it may be to show off their learning in the English language.

Bankim Chandra roundly denounced the custom, prevalent both among the poor and the rich, to marry off th,e boys early even before they earn their livelihood. About polygamy his position was that through greater moral awareness this practice was gradually witherthing away and Vidyasagar's effort to prove that this practice had no sanction in ancient scriptures was wrongheaded. The scriptures had sanctioned manv things offensive to modern sensibility and for advocating legislation to ban polygamy, quoting of scriptures is not necessary. In all his writings on history and culture Bankim Chandra shows himself as a man of modem outlook having values which we share even now. He is not at all overly respectful of the Indian tradition and mercilessly criticises the short-comings of this tradition. He was imbued with a nationalist spirit and as a Bengali and an Indian he defended the defensible and wanted through his social writing; to refashion the mental make-up of the Bengalis to goad them; on to greater achievements in every cultural field. His example in the fields of literature and historical scholarship is unparalleled and he practised what he preached by writing in Bengali his most profound thoughts on these subjects.

The leftist critics of Bankim Chandra have accused him of looking at the world through the eyes of the Western-educated Bengali gentry dependant on their livelihood on the grace of the British. He is sometimes said to be a Hindu revivalist who ignores the contributions of Muslims and other non-Hindu but indigenous sections. In this sense the English-educated service-holding Bengali landed gentry was cut off from the roots of the country and was thus incapable of bringing about overdue political, social and economic changes.

It can be said in Bankim Chandra's defence that he was perfectly aware of the cultural contributions of the lower classes and his anxiety for their economic amelioration was genuine. He really wanted social, economic and political justice for all. He attached great importance to the contemporary European social thought which led the way for revolutionary progress. Taking Europe as the standard, he wanted Indians to reach that standard. His revivalism consisted merely in this that he thought India in ancient times had achieved as much as the Europeans did. His India of-the future would ensure as much for the non-Hindus as for the Hindus, as much for the poor as for the well-off. He was as progressive in the modern sense as it was possible for him to be and as any one could rationally expect. If he erred he did in taking the contemporary Europe as his model. But the failings of the nationalistic spirit were not discernible in the nineteenth century.

There seemed to be scope for endless progress. The price paid by Europe for its nationalistic fervour in the twentieth century was unthinkable during Bankim Chandra's time and non-European models of social development are still inchoate. Will the Asians be able to develop alternative models which while preserving.the immensely valuable technological fruits of modem Europe will make all of mankind better human beings and the earth a happier place?

The social thought of Bankim Chandra naturally led him to reflect upon moral and spiritual matters during the final years of his life.

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