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Suniti Kumar Chatterji | |
|---|---|
 Chatterji,c. 1950 | |
| Born | (1890-11-26)26 November 1890 |
| Died | 29 May 1977(1977-05-29) (aged 86) Calcutta, West Bengal, India |
| Occupation(s) | Linguist, Educationist and Litterateur |
| Awards | Padma Vibhushan(1955) |
| Signature | |
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Suniti Kumar ChatterjiFRS (26 November 1890 – 29 May 1977) was an Indian linguist, educationist and litterateur. He was a recipient of the second highest Indian civilian honour ofPadma Vibhushan.[1]
Chatterji was born on 26 November 1890, atShibpur inHowrah. He was the son of Haridas Chattopadhyay, an affluentBengaliKulin Brahmin. According to the family history, their ancestors were originally residents of a village named chatuti in theRarh region of present-dayWest Bengal. During the Turkic invasion of Bengal in the thirteenth century, the Chatterji family left their ancestral village inWest Bengal and took shelter inEast Bengal.[2] Later Professor Chatterji's great-grandfather Sri Bhairab Chatterji, migrated to a village in the district ofHooghly from his ancestral village home in the district ofFaridpur inEast Bengal, now inBangladesh. Bhairab Chatterji, like many otherKulin Brahmins of the day, subsisted mainly on polygamy. Bhairab had a few wives, but he lived with the one who had belonged to the village in Hooghly. Bhairab's son Isvarchandra, the grandfather of Chatterji, had served theEast India Company in North India during theMutiny. After retirement, he built a modest one storied house for himself inCalcutta and shifted there the residence of the family from the Hooghly village. Isvar's son Haridas Chatterji was the father of Suniti Kumar Chatterji.[3]
Chatterji was a meritorious student, and passed the Entrance (school leaving) examination from theMutty Lal Seal's Free School (1907), ranking sixth, and the FA (pre-university examination) from the renownedScottish Church College, standing third.[citation needed] He did his Major (Honours) in English literature from Presidency College, Kolkata, standing first in the first class in 1911.[citation needed] His childhood friend was the famous industrialist Nagendra Nath Das founder of Power Tools And Appliance Co. Ltd. In 1913, he completed his M.A. in English literature, again standing first.[citation needed] The same year, he was appointed lecturer in English at Vidyasagar College, Kolkata where his colleague was the thespian,Sisir Kumar Bhaduri.[citation needed]
In 1914, Chatterji became assistant professor of English in the Post-Graduate Department of the University of Calcutta, which he held till 1919. He went abroad to study at theUniversity of London where he studiedPhonology, Indo-EuropeanLinguistics,Prakrit,Persian, Old Irish,Gothic and other languages. He then went to Paris and did research at theSorbonne in Indo-Aryan,Slavic and Indo-European Linguistics, Greek and Latin. His teacher was the internationally acclaimed linguist,Jules Bloch. After returning to India in 1922, he joined theUniversity of Calcutta as the Khaira Professor of Indian Linguistics and Phonetics. After retirement in 1952, he was made professor emeritus and later in 1965, the National Research Professor of India for Humanities.[citation needed]
Suniti Kumar accompaniedRabindranath Tagore toMalaya,Siam,Sumatra,Java, andBali, where he delivered lectures on Indian art and culture. He was Chairman of theWest Bengal Legislative Council (1952–58) and President (1969) of theSahitya Akademi.
His opinion on thehistoricity of theRamayana is quoted by Anil Kumar Kanjilal in his introduction to Chatterji's work,The Ramayana: Its Character, Genesis, History, Expansion and Exodus (1978). Chatterji says: 'There is evidently no historical core below the surface-no scholar of Indian history now thinks thatRama, the hero of theRamayana, was a historical person, who can be relegated to a particular period of rime.'[4]
On the question of author of the Ramayana, Chatterji says, 'The mythological saintChyavana, described in theSatapatha Brahmana and theMahabharatha, initiated the composition of this epic (Ramayana).Valmiki ... later imparted poetic lustre to the composition of his predecessor'.[4]
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)Bibliographies of Suniti Kumar Chatterji's work have also been published:
Suniti Kumar died on 29 May 1977 inCalcutta. A large part of his house 'Sudharma' সুধর্মা, an architectural marvel, in SouthCalcutta has been converted into aFabindia store.
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