Indian Council of Historical Research: Difference between revisions

Content deleted Content added

Inline

Revision as of 17:26, 8 March 2015

Logo of Indian Council of Historical Research

The Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) is plainly a Fund-disbursing Agency that disburses funds for carrying out research to Indian and Foreign Scholars on their specific applications for Fellowships, Grants, symposia etcetra. No Historical Research is carried out by the non academic employees of ICHR.

The source of the Funds, at the disposal of the ICHR is Grants-in- Aid received from the Department of Higher Education in the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Grants-in- Aid from various Indian States, private donations from individuals and other Countries and also from the proceeds of revenues from the sale of Publications of the ICHR.

The ICHR maintains a Corpus of Funds which has been continued to be deposited with UCO Bank at Ferozeshah Road, New Delhi.

Based in Delhi with Regional Centers in Bangaluru (Karnataka) and Gowahati (Assam), the Indian Council for Historical Research was established in 1972 by an Administrative Order of the then Ministry of Education of Government of India. The Regional Centers of the ICHR at Bangaluru was established by the Director, ICHR who joined the Institution from Bangalore.

""The Indian Council For Historical Research"" was registered under the Societies Registration Act of 1860 with the Department of Industries of Delhi Government, Delhi in 1972. There have been many moves to bring the Indian Council of Historical Research under the Ministry of Culture of Government of India but so far it has continued to be under the Ministry of Human Resource Development.It is understood that the current Central Government has moved notes to bring the ICHR under the Ministry of Culture.

The ICHR was formed as a Literary and Charitable Society, a fully funded Autonomous Body of the Ministry of Education with the historians R.S.Sharma the then Head Department of History, Delhi University, nominated as its first chairman,ICHR,^[1] Satish Chandra, J.S. Garewal and M.N. Prasad, the then the Director of the National Archives of India at the helms.

Some of the controversial and in- news- members/functionaries of the Indian Council have been Irfan Habib, Sushil Kumar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sushil_Kumar_(scholar),Tapan Raychaudhuri, BR Grover, S Settar, KS Lal and Barun De.

Review of the Functioning of ICHR

Since the ICHR has continued to be fully funded by the Government of India and all the administrative and Fiscal policies of the Government are applicable to its affairs the Government of India carries out a periodical review of the functioning of ICHR. Due to the lack of regular and timely review of the functioning of the ICHR the Institution has, quite often, landed itself in to controversies at the cost of historical research .

The first review of the ICHR was ordered in 1981, the second in 1999, and the third in March 2011. The report of the Review Committee of March 2011 can be perused from; http://mhrd.gov.in/sites/upload_files/mhrd/files/document-reports/Report-ICHR.pdf

Objectives

The Objectives of the ICHR, as enunciated in the initial Pamphlet published by the Department of Education, Government of India in 1972, are as under:

to bring historians together and provide a forum for exchange of views between them;
to give a national direction to an objective and scientific writing of history and to have rational presentation and interpretation of history;
to promote, accelerate and coordinate research in history with special emphasis on areas which have not received adequate attention so far;
to promote and coordinated a balanced distribution of research effort over different areas;
to elicit support and recognition for historical research from all concerned and ensure the necessary dissemination and use of results.

Funding , Expenses and Salaries

ICHR, as mentioned above, is fully funded by Grants-in-Aid received from the Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development. ICHR also receives funds from the various State governments of India, also from other Ministries of the Government of India . The Government has signed Cultural Exchange Programs (CEP) with many Countries with the exception of USA and UK.The host countries provide funds to the Scholars visiting under CEP.

The Audit of the he Funds/ Grants-in Aid in respect of the ICHR is regularly carried out by the Director General of Audit and Central Revenue (DGA&CR). The Audit Replies are required to be furnished by a permanent incumbent and the senior most regular employee of the Council viz the Director, Indian Council of Historical Research.

A copy of the Yearly Audit Report is also marked to the Secretary, Department of Higher Education as also the replies of the Audit Paras/ observations.

Fellowships and grants

There is no deadline for submitting applications for fellowships and Grants from the ICHR. These are received throughout the year. However the Meetings of the Research Grant Committees are held at regular intervals , after the receipt of the expert opinions upon the submitted applications as to the viability of a research project and/or Symposia on the convenience of its Chairman. The details of the Fellowships and Grants made by the ICHR are:

Junior Research Fellowship
General (Post-Doctoral) Fellowship
Senior Research Fellowship
Research Project
Contingency (Study- cum-Travel) Grant
Foreign Travel Grant
Publication Subsidy
Seminar/Workshop/Conference Grant
National Fellowship
Senior Academic Fellowship
Publication Subsidy
Grant for holding Seminar and Conferences.

Office building

The ICHR, unlike its sister research body, the Indian Council of Social Science Research- which had been formed by an Act of the Parliament, has no office building of its own. It has continued to be housed in a building belonging to the Jawaharlal Nehru University, at 35 Ferozeshah Road, New Delhi ever since 1972.

Organization

The Organization of the ICHR is headed by the Chairman with the Member Secretary functions as the Secretary of the Governing Council of ICHR during its General Body and Specially called for Meetings.

The Members of the Council of ICHR (Governing Body) are nominated for a period of Three Years.The Chairman of the Council of ICHR is nominated by the Department of Education in an Honorary capacity and his term is not co-terminus with that of the Members of the Constituted Council.

The Indian Council of Historical Research has been functioning without its Director Research and Administration and the Post has not been filled up after its incumbent got retired in September 2010 even when his Writ Petition for seeking Justice from High Court of Delhi for protecting his services threatened by the mala fides of the Chairman for exposing financial irregularities in ICHR was still pending.

The Petition was pending and was decided by the High Court of Delhi on 28.02.2011 http://lobis.nic.in/dhc/PKB/judgement/28-02-2011/PKB28022011CW63912003.pdf but before that time an acting Chairman , after the expiry of his term, had passed orders transgressing in to the sub judice matter.

Chairmen

R.S. Sharma, 1972 - 1977
A.R. Kulkarni, 1978 - 1981
Niharranjan Ray, 1981 - 1981
Lokesh Chandra, 1982 - 1985
Irfan Habib, 1986 - 1993
Ravinder Kumar, 1993 - 1996
S. Settar, 1996 - 1999
K.S. Sarma (acting), 1999 - 1999
B.R. Grover, 1999 - 2001
K.S. Lal, 2001 - 2001
M.G.S. Narayanan, 2001 - 2003
Kumud Bansal (acting), 2003 - 2004
D.N. Tripathi, 2004 - 2007
K.M. Acharya (acting), 2007 - 2007
Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, 4 March 2007 – 3 March 2010
Sabyasachi Bhattacharya ("Acting") 4 April 2010 – 20 May 2011
Basudev Chatterjee 20 May 2011- 2014
Yellapragada Sudershan Rao 28 June 2014 -

Directors

Professor B.R. Grover (1975-1986)
Dr. T.R. Sareen (1986-1997)
Wing Commander Dr. Sushil Kumar (1997-2010)

Member Secretaries

Professor M.G.S. Narayanan (1990-1991) (On Deputation from Calicut University)
Professor T.K.V. Subramaniam (1998-1999) (On Deputation from Delhi University)
Dr. R.C. Agrawal (2001-2003) (On Deputation from Archaeological Survey of India)
Dr. P.K. Shukla (2004-2007) ( On rolls the then Deputy Director of ICHR)
Dr. Ishrat Alam (2008-2011) ( On Deputation from Aligarh Muslim University)
Professor Gopinath Ravindran (On Deputation from Jamia Milia Islamia University)

Composition of the Council

The ICHR Council consists of the following members: •An eminent historian nominated by the Government of India who shall be the Chairman of the Council •Eighteen historians nominated by the Government of India • Representative of the UGC • Director General of the Archaeological Survey of India •Director General of the National Archives of India •Four persons to represent government who shall be nominated by the Government of India and which shall include one representative each of the Ministry of Education, the Department of Culture and the Ministry of Finance, and the Member Secretary -who is appointed by the Council of the ICHR on deputation basis for a period of three years ,with the approval of the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.

Members of the ICHR (2015-2018)

The Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India has announce the nomination of 18 Members of the Council as mentioned above , for a term of three years as the term of the previous Council Members had expired on 22.12.2015. http://ichr.ac.in/Councilmembersnew.pdf

Directory of Permanent Officers/ Employees of ICHR

The Directory of the permanent Officers/ employees of the ICHR , originally sanctioned by the Government of India is as follows:-

Director, ICHR (Re-designated as Director Research and Administration in 1989- the permanently sanctioned vital post of the ICHR has not been filled up after the incumbent was vindictively retired in September 2010 for his whistle blowing of rampant corruption in ICHR)

Director (Editing and Publication) [the permanently sanctioned post has not been filled up after the incumbent, a Scheduled Caste officer was charge sheeted and was not given even the salary of the post of the Director which he was holding]

Deputy Director Administration ( the post has not been filled up after the incumbent retired in 1989) A person who joined on deputation as Deputy Director Accounts more than Five years ago is continuing in the ICHR, against all the Rules of Deputation, is holding the additional charge of Deputy Director Accounts.

Assistant Director Grants ( the post is being filled up ,on deputation basis after the retirement of the incumbent)

Deputy Director (Library)

Deputy Director (Documentation)

Two Deputy Directors Research

Two Assistant Directors Research

One Deputy Director Editing

One Deputy Director Publications

Deputy Director (Research) Southern Regional Centre, Bangalore.

Deputy Director (Research) North East Regional Centre, Guwahati.

Section Officer (Administration I)

Section Officer (Administration II)

Caretaker

Publications

The ICHR publishes on web as well as on print media. The Chairman's Column , re-termed as Chairman's Diary by its current incumbent has only recently been updated in January 2015 after almost a year. The list of the Members of the Council , even though revised by the Government is still as old as July 2014, carrying even the names who are no longer Members of the ICHR.

The ICHR publishes two journals: the Indian Historical Review (bi-annually) and Itihas (in Hindi). In addition, it provides publication subsidies to seminars, books, congress proceedings and journals. The Editing and Publication has been outsourced to certain Publishing Houses)

References

^ "The man who made history". The Times of India. 22 August 2011. Retrieved 9 August 2013.

External links

[1] "The man who made history". The Times of India. 22 August 2011. Retrieved 9 August 2013.

[1]

@@ Line 62: / Line 62: @@
 ==Organization==
 The Organization of the ICHR  is headed by the  Chairman with the Member Secretary functions as the Secretary of the Governing Council of ICHR during its General Body and Specially called for Meetings.
-The day to day Administration of the ICHR  even though required to be handled  by the Director Research and Administration has been put in the hands of  on  deputation  officials .
 The Members of the  Council of ICHR (Governing Body)  are nominated for a period of Three Years.The Chairman of the Council of ICHR is nominated by the Department of Education in an Honorary capacity and his term is not co-terminus with that of the Members of the Constituted Council.
-For most of the time,  ever since the inception of ICHR, the Regular  Director of the ICHR(Re-designated as Director Research and Administration in 1989)  had functioned as the ex Officio Member Secretary of the Council but this arrangement was, reportedly  done away with when the Director, ICHR   started questioning  the  un- authorized by Government of India/ Governing Body of ICHR  expenses upon the Foreign Trips of Member Secretaries and Chairmen as also the  expenditures in doing up repairs and furnishing of their homes under the coined up names of Home office/ Camp Office.
 The Indian Council of Historical Research  has been functioning without its Director Research and Administration and the Post  has not been  filled up after its incumbent got retired in September 2010  even when his Writ Petition for seeking Justice from High Court of Delhi for  protecting his services threatened by the  mala fides of the Chairman for exposing financial irregularities in ICHR was still pending.