Mob destroys invaluable pages of history

[Guest guest]

EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE

 

Pune's prestigious Bhandarkar institute may have lost a priceless

collection, including rare Jain Manuscripts.

 

 

PUNE, JANUARY 5: Pouncing on what should have been the subject of a

literary debate, hooligans in Pune today robbed the country of a

treasure trove when they ransacked the Bhandarkar Oriental Research

Institute, home to a large number of rare books, manuscripts and

priceless articles.

 

Days after forcing historian James Laine to apologise for his

observations on the parentage of Maratha warrior king Shivaji — the

Oxford University Press had to even recall Laine's Shivaji: Hindu

king in Islami India — a 200-strong mob, calling itself the Sambhaji

Brigade of the Maratha Seva Sangh, landed at the Bhandarkar institute

this morning and went on the rampage.

 

Snapping telephone lines, the mob tore books, rare writings and

damaged artefacts and several framed paintings and photos. The

departments of Mahabharatiya, manuscripts, publication, postgraduate

teaching and research bore the brunt of the attack.The police showed

up 45 minutes after the attack, citing ``lack of information''as the

reason for the delay. So far, 72 people have been arrested.

 

 

 

The shocking incident comes in the wake of the December 22 incident

when Shiv Sena supporters manhandled and humiliated historian

Shrikant Bahulkar, named by Laine in the book's acknowledgements.

 

Later, Sena leader Raj Thackeray apologised to Bahulkar, also a

member of the Bhandarkar institute's governing council.

 

The Bhandarkar institute, which attracts world scholars was

established on July 6, 1917. By 1920, the then Bombay administration

had handed over its entire collection of 20,000 manuscripts to the

institute for indexing and preservation.

 

Today's attack outraged the literary circle. Estimating the damage is

going to be the first and most painful task. Says former institute

secretary M G Dhadphale: ``It's difficult to even comprehened the

extent of the loss. With the 1920s collection and books from

Bhandarkar's pesonal library damaged, where do we go from here?''

 

``Someone found a copy of Sanacharya's commentary on the Rig Veda

lying on the road. He was sensible enough to return it to me.'' M A

Mehendale, chief editor of the cultural index of Mahabharata, summed

it up when he said: ``Our entire life's effort has been destroyed by

these senseless people.''

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