The Sacred and the Secular: Bengal Muslim Discourses, 1871-1977

Book Description
This interdisciplinary study in socio-political and intellectual history examines the tension between religious and secular perceptions among the intelligentsia in Bengal in matters pertaining to their social, cultural, and political lives. It explores the wide impact of their local Indian, trans-Indian, colonial, and post-colonial experiences and predicts a continued struggle between religious and secular forces to determine the nature of the state in the foreseeable future.

Card catalog description
Role of the Bengal Muslim intelligentsia in politics, social change, and cultural values.


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This study traces the emergence and development of a Muslim intelligentsia in Bengal and examines the tension between religious and secular perceptions which they experience in their social and political lives. It explores the various factors which have influenced the ideological position of the intelligentsia, such as ideas derived from their local Indian and trans-Indian linkages as well as contact with a colonial culture. It argues that while religion has always played an important role in the life of the intelligentsia its particular manifestation in political life is a recent phenomenon owing to colonial experiences as well as concerns about legitimacy in the post-colonial phase. It presents an in-depth account of the major discourses in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Bengal including controversies regarding language, identity and nationalism. The distinctiveness of the study lies in its subject matter and the inter-disciplinary approach to it. The study has attempted to relate the ideological orientations of the intelligentsia to their social bases. It finds that the dominant ideology is determined to a large extent by the nature of the ruling elite, its social base as well as its educational and intellectual orientations.


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