National Workshop Lecture

Purushottam Agrawal

Purushottam Agrawal is a historian of ideas and literature with a keen interest in reading Indian traditions from a critical creative perspective. Professor Agrawal is a British Academy fellow at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge. He has been a visiting professor at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Cambridge and at El Colegio de Mexico. He was the Chairperson of the Centre of Indian Languages, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

Professor Agrawal writes in Hindi and English and emphasizes the decisive importance of vernacular sources for an authentic understanding of Indian history and society. His book Akath Kahani Prem Ki: Kabir ki Kavita aur Un ka Samay (2009) has been widely acclaimed as a path-breaking study of Kabir and his work; its Telugu translation was published in 2015.

His other books include Hindi Serai: Astrakhan via Yerevan (2013), a travelogue which traces the history of Indian traders who settled in the Russian city of Astrakhan between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries; and Padmavat: An Epic Love Story (2018), an English translation of and commentary on Malik Muhammad Jayasi’s epic poem. His anthology, Who is Bharat Mata? published in 2019 is a selection from Nehru’s writings and speeches about history, culture and the Idea of India and has been translated into Hindi, Kannada and Marathi. Kabir, Kabir: The Early Modern Poet and Philosopher (2021) has caused considerable excitement both amongst experts and lay readership. Currently, he is working on a book about Hinduism.

Professor Agrawal made his debut as a novelist with NaCoHus (2016), which has been translated into Marathi and English. He hosts the show Kitab on Rajya Sabha TV. He regularly delivers talks nationwide; in 2005, his Gandhi Peace Foundation Lecture was published as Majbooti ka naam Mahatma Gandhi (2005). He remains among the most credible and candid voices to be reckoned with today.