I read with interest the article “Challenges from across the Border” in which the author laments apathetic attitude of the Pakistani historians who failed to respond to the challenges of the Hindu(Indian)  historians. It appears from the contents of the article that the learned author is not aware about the evolution  and development of historiography in India. There are a number of misinformation in his article. First I would like to clarify them. The periodisation of the Indian history as the Hindu, the Muslim, and the British was not done by any Hindu historian but by a British historian, James Mill, the author of the “History of British India”. He intentionally divided the history on religious basis, but did not call the British period a Christian period in order to keep a secular outlook, and to maintain a balance between these two opposite religious communities. This periodisation is challenged and severely criticised by an Hindu (?) Historian known as Romella Thaper. In India, historians no more use these terminology whereas in Pakistan historians persist to use them. The three Indian leading historians in a collection of articles titled as” Communalism in writing Indian history” point out the communal characteristics in the Indian history from the ancient period to the modern time.(It is translated by me in Urdu as Tarikh aur Firqawariyat).

 Again it is wrong to assume that the so called Muslim period is intentionally distorted by the Indian historians. After the Independence, Aligarh University’s history Department published excellent research works on the medieval history and added more knowledge and information about the individual rulers, ruling dynasties, and cultural, social, and economic development during this period. Still, all the major Indian universities have excellent Department of Medieval history  where historians are busy in research.I remember that when I participated in a seminar on Akbar’s 450 birthday there were nearly 50 Historians belonging to the Mughal period with the knowledge of Persian. (And how many do we have in Pakistan?)

The papers which were presented in the seminar  highlighted the different aspects of the Mughal period from politics to culture and from trade and commerce to architecture and painting.

It should also be kept in mind that in India, there are not only Hindu historians, but also Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, and  Jains, if we divide them  on the basis of their faith. Moreover, there is not one school of thought but many. There are nationalists, Marxists, Subalterns, and communalists. Among them the weakest groups is the group of communalist historians which is already relegated to lowest position in spite of the emergence of the BJP.The other groups of historians are writing history with new  vigour and enthusiasm. In my view there is a” historical Revolution” which is going on  in India .It is changing the whole concepts of the traditional historiography. R.C Mujamdar belongs to the communal group of historian and rarely has any credibility among the Indian historians. Those historians who have respect and contributed to the Indian historiography are Irfan Habib, Harbans Mukhia, Muzaffar Alam,Iqtidar Alam Khan, Romella Thaper, Bipan Chandar, Sumit Sarkar, Gyanendra Pandey, Shahid Amin, and Mushirul Hassan.(to name a few)

 Having so diverse a group of historians, the Indian historiography  has assumed a position  to influence the history writing internationally. For example, the subaltern school attracts historian from USA and Europe to make their research on these lines. The great contribution of the Indian historiography is that it challenged the colonial version of history and created their own historical knowledge system  to retrieve the past which was ignored and neglected by the colonial historians. We must also keep in mind that the Indian historiography is not bound by any ideological  framework. The historians are free to interpret according to their view points and are ready to face criticism and challenges. Under these circumstances, there is less chance to distort history because the others are ready to challenge and respond.  For example, Aurangzeb is not defended in Pakistan  as he was  by the Indian historians. There are nearly 7 or 8 research books on Aurangzeb besides articles in which he is presented as a pragmatic  and not orthodox king.

Personally, I believe that there is a great need to learn from the Indian historians rather to reject or condemn them without reading and understanding them. One of the reasons of our ignorance is that we don’t have access to the historical literature which is publishing in India. We also don’t have any contact with the Indian historians on institutional level. Further, assuming that Indian historian are distorting history, we don’t bother to read them and understand them.How a  student of history can forget that even during the colonial period nearly all  major research work on the Medieval( Muslim) period was done by the Hindu historians such as Ishwar Prasad, Saksena, Beni Parasad, and Qanungo to name a few ?

 I think that not the Indians but the Pakistani historians are responsible to distort our history. So, we shouldn’t be afraid of the Indian historians but of own (if there are any more ) to mislead us in concealing truth rather than revealing it.The reality is that we don’t have any particular school of thought in history except the official one which interprets the history according to two nation theory. Now, after passing the old generation of Medieval historians , we don’t have any. Our history department have history teachers but not historians. This is the real challenge that we are facing: Within  our own society and not from  across the border.