The late scholar and historian, Dr. Bishambhar Nath Pande%u2019s research efforts exploded myths on Aurangzeb%u2019s rule. They also offer an excellent example of what history has to teach us if only we study it dispassionately
The Muslim rule in India lasted for almost 1,000 years. How come then, asked the British historian Sir Henry Elliot, that Hindus %u201Chad not left any account which could enable us to gauge the traumatic impact the Muslim conquest and rule had on them?%u201D Since there was none, Elliot went on to produce his own eight%u2013volume History of India from with contributions from British historians (1867). His history claimed Hindus were slain for disputing with %u2018Muhammedans%u2019, generally prohibited from worshipping and taking out religious processions, their idols were mutilated, their temples destroyed, they were forced into conversions and marriages, and were killed and massacred by drunk Muslim tyrants. Thus Sir Henry, and scores of other Empire scholars, went on to produce a synthetic Hindu versus Muslim history of India, and their lies became history.
However, the noted Indian scholar and historian, Dr Bishambhar Nath Pande, who passed away in New Delhi on June 1, 1998, ranked among the very few Indians and fewer still Hindu historians who tried to be a little careful when dealing with such history. He knew that this history was %u2018originally compiled by European writers%u2019 whose main objective was to produce a history that would serve their policy of divide and rule.
Lord Curzon (Governor General of India 1895%u201399 and Viceroy 1899%u20131904 (d.1925) was told by the Secretary of State for India, George Francis Hamilton, that they should %u201Cso plan the educational text books that the differences between community and community are further strengthened%u201D.
Another Viceroy, Lord Dufferin (1884%u201388), was advised by the Secretary of State in London that the %u201Cdivision of religious feelings is greatly to our advantage%u201D, and that he expected %u201Csome good as a result of your committee of inquiry on Indian education and on teaching material%u201D.
%u201CWe have maintained our power in India by playing%u2013off one part against the other%u201D, the Secretary of State for India reminded yet another Viceroy, Lord Elgin (1862%u201363), %u201Cand we must continue to do so. Do all you can, therefore, to prevent all having a common feeling.%u201D
In his famous Khuda Bakhsh Annual Lecture (1985) Dr Pande said: %u201CThus under a definite policy the Indian history text%u2013books were so falsified and distorted as to give an impression that the medieval (i.e., Muslim) period of Indian history was full of atrocities committed by Muslim rulers on their Hindu subjects and the Hindus had to suffer terrible indignities under Muslim rule. And there were no com
