Harasankar had a long-lasting impact on different aspects of social, political and educational life of West Bengal, as the state came to be known after Partition (and subsequent independence) of India. In short: he left a deep mark as a leading educator, an economic historian of the subinfeudation and the formation of a rentier class after the 1793 Permanent Settlement of Bengal, as an organiser of College and University Teachers which became a powerful trade union, viz West Bengal College and University Teachers’ Association or WBCUTA, and a populariser of Marxist ideology. He was the author of many books on economics, but is better known internationally for his two books written in English language: < href="http://home.netspeed.com.au/kuntala.david/4.Indian_Economic_Historysmall.pdf">the Economic History of India, and his research work, Zamindars and Patnidars published by the University of Burdwan in 1985. His study on the impact of the British industrial revolution on the Indian economy is also well-known. Unfortunately, the political climate in West Bengal during the 1980s was such that his great talents were less recognised than they should have been had he lived in another time or place.

During the early days of WBCUTA. Harasankar is 5th from the right in the front row (Photo from 1950s)

Formative Years as a Marxist

During his time in Calcutta University, Harasankar came into contact with Marxist ideology through his reading of Rajani Palme Datt and Manabendra Nath Roy’s revolutionary ideas. Gradually, he became involved in politics; initially with student politics where he took the early lessons in Communist ideology, and then with the Indian People’s Theatrical Association (IPTA)’s Calcutta Chapter that centred around Jamuna’s family. The association with the sons of the Nandy family, particularly Surapati, who was the third son and an elder brother of Jamuna, was also critical to him personality blossoming into a great orator with deep knowledge of Marxist literature and a free spirit. The Nandy mansion in Lower Circular Road was at the centre of the Indian People’s Theatrical Movement at that time, and the activities of IPTA exposed both to individuals who later went on to be important personalities for the Bengalis – Salil Chowdhury and Debabrata Biswas were notable among them. Gradually became more inclined towards labour movements, particularly the organisation of industrial labour into unions. By 1947, when India became independent, he was a member of the Communist Party of India, as one of the early activists for the organisation.
Harasankar and Jamuna married through a civil union on 19th July, in 1950. Jamuna was at that time a young girl of sixteen years. Professor Ashutosh Bhattacharyya, Harasankar’s father and a conservative Brahmin, and also a staunch pro-nationalist, could not accept this union and disowned Harasankar. Later, through a legal deed of statement written in 1960, Harasankar’s father disinherited him from his property. All this was because, although she was from a well-known Brahmo family, Jamuna was from a lower caste woman from a different religion. Such unions were relatively unheard of in those days. As one can imagine, this rejection by his father left a long-lasting imprint on Harasankar; on the one hand, he strove for recognition by his father through his -achievement in life as an academic and scholar, but also as a successful man who was able to create his own assets and direct his own life. He largely built up his assets through income from teaching and writing books and owned several properties. On the other hand, he chose not to follow any particular religion and embraced Marxism more deeply. He stood up for his own secular and enlightened beliefs, upholding honesty and social activism and religiously following them as the guiding principles in life. He also became a champion of inter-caste and inter-religious marriages, and many of his students later received support from him when they ventured into the then not widely charted path in their lives. He taught his students and children to become fiercely independent and rational in their views, upholding the ability to judge things for themselves and think about things critically. Small efforts, such as working on his stutter by speaking slowly, worked wonders and soon his oratory skills became unparalleled amongst his colleagues. His oration remained with him until death, making him one of the legendary public speakers, who inspired generations of younger people in leftist ideology.

Early Careerst

Following his marriage to Jamuna, Harasankar had taken up a job in the ’s (AG Bengal) office located in Dalhousie Square, the Central Business District of in Calcutta. It was from this position that he sat in the highly competitive Indian Administrative Services (IAS) examination. It is known that he took a leave of four days from the AG Bengal office for this examination, and ranked fourth in this extremely difficult all-India examination. It is rumoured that at the interview, he surprised the interviewers by appearing in his typical Bengali attire of a set of white ‘dhoti and punjabi’, something that was quite uncommon at the time amongst the young and bright men, aspiring to administer India following the rules and conventions established by the colonial British. Once selected, the political background of all IAS officers were searched by the police in those days, and they found that he was a member of the Communist Party which was banned by the then Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, for its activism amongst the refugees who had migrated across the borders during the Partition. He was instructed to sign a bond, giving up his ideology and Party membership, but he refused. Consequently, not only did he not get admitted into the IAS cadre, but he was sacked from the government job at the AG Bengal. This led the young couple in deeper into financial penury, encouraging him eventually to take up the position of a Lecturer in Economics in Kanungopara College in Chittagong, East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) in 1953. After about three years, Harasankar took up a job as a Lecturer in Economics in the historic Raj College in Burdwan town, the district headquarters of Burdwan, one of the most prosperous, agriculturally and in terms of resources such as coal, rich districts of India. As can be expected, the population of Burdwan in mid-1950s was more conservative and tradition-bound than those who lived in the Metropolitan city of Calcutta. Therefore, establishing a life in the town was a challenge.

Early Years in Burdwan

The 1961 Chinese aggression on India’s border led to a split in the Communist Party of India (CPI) that had played a significant role in determining the direction of Harasankar’s life. As the Communist Party divided into two (the CPI and the CPI (M)) long-held close friendships were lost to ideology, marking the beginning of a deep political animosity against each other. Many childhood friends and comrades moved to the pro-China faction that split as the CPI (M), whereas Harasankar chose to stay with the pro-Russia CPI. The significance of the factional division became more apparent during the 1972 elections when the CPI chose to align with the which had initiated several steps to pull India out of feudal heritage (such as the abolition of first the Zamindari system and then the privy purse for the erstwhile Maharajas). It was also moving, under the leadership of Indira Gandhi, towards a more Soviet-type economic system by formalising state-control over the ‘commanding heights’ of the economy. The nationalisation of collieries, banks and the state-owned steel plants gave the assurance to the CPI that the national bourgeoisie was willing to adopt a socialist model, and it made more sense to ‘work with them’ rather than ‘work against them’ to achieve the socialist goals.

As the Principal of TDB College

In 1980, Harasankar took up the position of the Principal of Tribeni Devi Bhalotia College, an institution established in 1957 in the colliery belt of West Bengal in eastern India. The college was one of the largest institutions under the University of Burdwan, running in three shifts – morning, day and night – and producing a very large number of graduate students in a wide range of fields and disciplines. He remained its Principal until his sudden death in 1991. During his tenure the college grew by leaps and bounds, and turned into one of the premier institutions of tertiary education with a special emphasis on practical and vocation-oriented learning. A sudden stroke intervened at the age of 63, killing Harasankar within a few hours of its strike at early morning hours on 10th January, 1990. He left his wife Jamuna, sons Sandip and Sukanti, and daughter Kuntala.