Book review: Ubaidur Rahman Siddiqui,Ghazipur: A Journey through Political–Cultural History,From Ancient Times to Pre-independence

It is a widespread complaint that local history is a branch of history that is little developed in India. One has often to look to the District Gazetteers, mostly of British times, to satisfy one’s curiosity about the past of any locality. The author of the book under review is therefore to be congratulated for a voluminous work that includes a detailed survey of the annals and antiquities of the district of Ghazipur, situated in eastern Uttar Pradesh. Thus, two Aśokan pillars (one with an inscription of Skandagupta) are duly described, along with references to other antiquities (pp. 130–70). The author here uses the various archaeological reports (from Cunningham onwards) besides his own observations.

Coming to medieval times, Siddiqui uses various sources to reconstruct the history of the district. The circumstances in which the city of Ghazipur came into existence and got its name (‘City of Holy Warrior’) are, however, still not clear (vide 228–29). The account of the district becomes much fuller when we come to the period of the Mughals. The author provides an interesting analysis of the Ā’īn-i Akbarī’s revenue statistics of the Ghazipur area (404–18) and a description of Mughal monuments (421–48).

Coming to modern times, the volume is full of local history. Curiously, the detailed account of events of 1857–58 follows, while it should have preceded, a detailed account of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan’s cultural and educational work at Ghazipur (697 ff.), and notices of persons who took part in the 1857 Rebellion are mixed up with notices of participants in the National Movement.

Despite these few reservations, one should be grateful for the detailed account of the archaeological remains and notices of individuals of the past in the Ghazipur district that the author has given us. The book contains at the end a number of photographs of antiquities that greatly enhance its value. One hopes the cause of local history would be similarly taken up by other hands in other localities. The book would have gained from some professional editing. The author is also the publisher and gives the following as his address: Ubaidur Rahman Siddiqui, Samad Manzil, Machhar Hatta, Ghazipur, 233001 (UP), Mobile No. 8604730403.