“Who Controls The Past Controls The Future”: Exploring the Dichotomies of Historical Interpretations

On the 20th of December 2020, the students of the History Department, Bhawanipur Education Society College organised ‘The Annual Students’ Webinar 2020′ on “Who Controls The Past Controls The Future”: Exploring the Dichotomies of Historical Interpretations. The students presented papers virtually on various themes pertaining to the distortion of history. The event was divided into two sessions: Morning (10:30 AM to 12:30 PM) and Afternoon (2:00 PM to 4:00 PM). The event began with an address by Professor Debjani Ganguly, Vice Principal (Arts), followed by the presentation of a poem composed by Poulomi Sinha from third semester. Dr Rajarshi Chunder, Assistant Professor of History, Krishnath College, had been invited to chair the first session. The first paper was presented on ‘Moving Beyond Religion: Looking at Two Transgressional Worlds’ by Anubhab Chatterjee from third semester. It dealt with distortion of the history of the ‘muslim rule in India’ (c. 1200-1800 CE). The second paper was presented by Aman Bandopadhyay from first year on ‘Understanding Secularism in the Context of Post-Colonial India’, which delved into how the endorsement or denouncement of the idea of ‘secularism’ has often led to historical distortion. The third paper titled ‘The Predicament of Heritage in the Context of Modern 

Bengal’ presented by first semester student Srijani Shaw dealt with the loss of heritage in contemporary Calcutta. The fourth and final paper of the first session titled ‘Extremism and the Distortion of History’ was presented by fifth semester student Arnab Das who explored how dogmatism or extremism in various domains have proliferated at the expense of historical accuracy. Following the presentation of these papers, Dr Chunder took questions from the audience, which were answered by respective participants. The first session was concluded at 12:30 PM by the delivery of Key Notes by Dr Chunder, and a vote of thanks given by Professor Piu Chatterjee of the History Department. 

After an hour and a half of lunch break, the second session of the event began at 2:00 PM. It was chaired by Shri Arup Ratan Samajdar from the Film Studies Department, Bhawanipur Education Society College. The first paper titled ‘Reality or Falsification- Depiction of History in Popular Culture’ was jointly presented by third year student Neena Ghosh and third semester student Disha Chatterjee. It analysed historical inaccuracies in popular culture, and bollywood films in particular. The second paper titled ‘Distortion of History and Fashion’ was another joint presentation by third semester students Poulomi Sinha and Shreashy Dhar. The third and final paper of the event was ‘Influence of the Cyber-Space on Popular Historical Consciousness’, which highlighted the pressing issue of misinformation and distortion of history over the world wide web, and particularly on social media platforms. It was presented by third semester student Saqlain Shakil. This was followed by a question and answer session presided over by, and the key notes delivered by Shri Arup Ratan Samajdar. The event was successfully concluded by a vote of thanks jointly delivered by Professors Piu Chatterjee and Debjani Ganguly.