Originally Published in The Times of India (Chandigarh), March 2, 2015.
Source url: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/Ghadar-files-in-Urdu-wait-to-be-explored-in-Japan/articleshow/46427080.cms
PATIALA: A Japanese scholar from University of Tokyo has claimed that around a century-old file containing Urdu manuscripts of Ghadar activists is lying unexplored in Japan and could reveal a lot about the activities of Ghadarites from 1909 to 1930s.
Originally Published in The Times of India (Chandigarh), March 2, 2015.
Source url: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/Ghadar-files-in-Urdu-wait-to-be-explored-in-Japan/articleshow/46427080.cms
PATIALA: A Japanese scholar from University of Tokyo has claimed that around a century-old file containing Urdu manuscripts of Ghadar activists is lying unexplored in Japan and could reveal a lot about the activities of Ghadarites from 1909 to 1930s.
Based on her research, Kaori Mizukamib has presented a research paper titled "Staying in Japan, Working Beyond Japan: Perspectives from Japanese Sources on the Ghadar Movement" at a three-day Punjab History Congress, which concluded in Patiala on Sunday.
She said that besides letters written by Ghadar activities, the files also include observations by then Japanese police authorities and correspondence between the British embassy in Tokyo and the Japanese authorities regarding Ghadar activists staying in Japan.
Kaori Mizukami, research scholar at Division of Asian Studies, School of Humanities and Sociology, University of Tokyo, was here to attend the 47th Punjab History Congress. She said that the files, which are in possession of Diplomatic Archives of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan government, are yet to be explored by researchers, especially Indian historians, to dig out facts regarding Ghadar activists’ stay in Japan.
"In the early twentieth century, some active Indian revolutionaries such as Maulvi Barkatullah, Bhagwan Singh, Rash Behari Bose and Tarak Nath Das came to Japan. Since they were kept under observation by Japanese authorities, the records on these Indian revolutionaries have remained in the Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Japan," Kaori added.
Titled ‘Collection of Miscellaneous Articles on the Internal Affairs of Each Country, British India, Regarding Revolutionary Party (including Exiles)’, the file mainly comprises records of observations by Japanese police and correspondence between the British embassy in Tokyo and the Japanese authorities, she added.
Kaori added that the files have so far largely been consulted by a few Japanese scholars, who were interested in life of Bengali Ghadar activist Rash Bihari Bose, who was accused of hatching a conspiracy to kill Lord John Harding in 1912. Bose fled to Japan in 1915 and stayed here till his death in 1945.
"The information available in these files about Ghadar activists’ stay in Japan has not been fully exploited yet. If some Indian authors explore these documents and manuscripts, especially the letters written by Ghadar activists in Urdu, new facets could be revealed," she added.