This book maps the intellectual and cultural transformation that India witnessed in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries through the three Tagores Dwarkanath Tagore (17941846), Debendranath Tagore (18171905) and Rabindranath Tagore (18611941). It examines how these three generations of Tagores drew on the intellectual strands of the time to chart a different course for Indias socio-cultural and politico-ideological development in the wake of colonial rule. The author looks at the various progressive measures introduced by the Tagores that sought to combat the prevalent socio-cultural practices which were aimed at segregating people on the basis of caste, religion and ethnicity.
An important addition to the study of Indias social metamorphosis, the book will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of history, political science, colonialism, cultural studies and South Asian studies.
Preface and acknowledgements viii Introduction xv PART A Dwarkanath
Tagore 1 1 Shaping Bengals socio-ideological universe 7 2 A successful
entrepreneur in adverse circumstances 30 PART B Debendranath Tagore 63 3
Continuity with Dwarkanath Tagores socio-ideological ideas 69 4 Breaking
with the past by reinforcing the indigenous intellectual traditions 94 PART C
Rabindranath Tagore 127 5 Espousal of both derivative and contextual
socio-economic and politico-ideological thoughts 133 6 Articulation of an
innovative nationalist design 165 Concluding observations 195 Select
bibliography 199 Index 205
Bidyut Chakrabarty was former Vice Chancellor of Visva Bharati, Santiniketan, West Bengal, India. Before he was appointed Vice Chancellor of Visva Bharati in 2018, he served the Department of Political Science, University of Delhi, India, for more than three decades. He has published in many areas of Political Science.