The West Bengal State Archives evolving out of the Secretariat Record Office (1910) of the Bengal Presidency has completed its hundred year's journey in 2010. This treasure house of documentary heritage contains reflection of major defining moments of socio-economic and political history of the country through government policy decisions and activities.
Archives being repositories of records preserve the documentary heritage of governmental initiatives and actions. According to T. R. Schellenberg, the kind of records that create archives are as follows: "Those records of any public or private institution which are adjudged worthy of permanent preservation for reference and research purpose and which have been deposited or have been selected for deposit in an archival institution".
The origin of the modern archives may be traced back to the French Revolution in 1789. The idea of liberalism and people's participation in Government made record keeping a prime obligation of the State. In 1790, the National Archives in France was established. It was the first National Archives established by any country. The principle of public access to archives was proclaimed and the responsibility of the State for care of the valuable documents of the past was recognized. Records of the New France were to be kept there; records that testified her gains and flaunted her glories.
In 1838, National Archives of England was founded. The reasons behind its establishment were quite different from those that impelled the French Revolutionaries to establish their archives. The British intention to preserve evidence of her imperial set-up as well as records of administration of earlier years was the prime impetus behind the establishment of the archives in England. The British carried with them this tradition and set up archives wherever they went.
Among the archives built by the British, the West Bengal State Archives occupies a pre-eminent position. Calcutta, in the old Bengal Presidency covering a large area from Arakan to Agra, being the most important seat of British imperial power in entire South Asia, was the first site to witness efforts towards the development of archival institution. The archives that evolved out of a Secretariat Record Office at that time obviously had holdings that referred to subjects far wider than the concerns of the present state of West Bengal.
The history of the evolution of the State Archives of West Bengal is a fascinating one. In this present volume our main focus is to follow up its process of evolution that culminated into the formation of a separate Directorate in 2009. Before going into detail of this process, we have tried to refute the popular idea that the credit of systematic record keeping in India goes to the British. An in-depth study of the history of record keeping from the dawn of civilization reveals that the subcontinent had a long tradition of keeping account of every important transaction much before the advent of the British in India.
Hindu (886)
Agriculture (95)
Ancient (1020)
Archaeology (619)
Architecture (535)
Art & Culture (865)
Biography (598)
Buddhist (545)
Cookery (158)
Emperor & Queen (496)
Islam (235)
Jainism (274)
Literary (877)
Mahatma Gandhi (360)
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