Rupak G. Duarah
(rintu.duarah@gmail.com)
Dr. Hitesh Deka is among the most distinctive educationists, academic administrators and cultural thinkers of contemporary Assam. For more than three decades, he has remained closely associated with higher education in the state. He now serves as the founding Vice Chancellor of Nagaon University. Earlier, he held the same office at Krishna Kanta Handiqui State Open University and at Mahapurusha Srimanta Sankaradeva Viswavidyalaya. Before those appointments, he was Principal of K. C. Das Commerce College, Guwahati, for nearly fifteen years.
A former student leader of the Assam Movement, Dr. Deka was elected to the Assam Legislative Assembly in 1991 from Kamalpur. He soon left electoral politics to devote himself wholly to education. Under his leadership K. C. Das Commerce College earned national recognition through innovative academic programmes. He also oversaw the publication of the widely acclaimed volume ‘Assam: Land and People’, brought out to mark the college’s silver jubilee. As Vice-Chancellor of Krishna Kanta Handiqui State Open University, he initiated several ambitious projects, among them the forty-one-volume ‘Asom Shishu Sahitya Kosh’ of which he was the chief editor.
Guided by the ideal of ‘Chiradin Asomiya’, Dr. Deka remains deeply committed to the preservation and promotion of the Assamese language, literature and culture, and especially to the strengthening of mother-tongue medium schools. He has been associated with numerous socio-cultural organisations and briefly served as editor of the leading daily ‘Dainik Asam’. That combination of classroom, college & university campus and newsroom experience gives him an unusual vantage on the life of a society that has long argued with itself about identity, belonging and change.
Deka’s recently published book ‘Sanskritir Uttaradhikar’ is an intellectually stimulating exploration of society and culture, set against a historical backdrop. For at least three decades, phrases such as ‘cultural crisis’ and ‘cultural conflict’ have circulated with weary familiarity in public debate. The book asks whether such a crisis - and the clash of cultures within society - has become inevitable. From that starting point, it proceeds to more fundamental questions. These questions are not posed in the abstract. They speak to a society that has lived through agitation, political transition, linguistic anxiety and the accelerating pressure of global media. Dr. Deka writes as someone who has watched Assamese public life from the lecture hall, the vice-chancellor’s office and the editor’s desk. He does not treat culture as a museum of customs to be guarded, nor as a slogan to be brandished. He treats it as an inheritance that must be examined, questioned and renewed, if it is to remain alive.
The chapters of the book - including Sanskritir Uttaradhikar, Sanskritir Nirman aru Punornirman, Sanskritir Upadanrupe Bignan, Sanskritik Boibidhya, Sanskritik Sankat aru Sishu Monot Prabhab, Jonopriya Sanskritir Keitaman Nobya Upakaran, Sanskritik Jatiyatabad and Sangya, Sambhawana aru Boishyeek Biswat Pratyahban - examine culture in close and sustained detail. The author’s effort to grasp the idea of society and culture often feels like the solving of an intricate riddle. Concepts that might have stayed locked in sociological jargon are opened through historical illustration and a conversational cadence that invites the reader to think along with the writer. The result is a book equally valuable to students of the social sciences and to thoughtful general readers seeking a fresh, original perspective on these enduring questions.
‘SanskritirUttaradhikar’ is written in an engaging, almost novel-like style. Rather than a dry academic treatise, it unfolds as a researcher’s adventurous journey. The cover design by Dr. Sanjib Borah lends the volume both dignity and visual appeal. The illustrations and printing are equally refined. Published by Bandhav, one of Guwahati’s leading houses, the book is priced at Rs. 200.