Report on 19|47 Archive

The department of Library & Information received a communique from the

19|47 Archive Team for 'Citizen Historian's Programme for the
department's students, and the same was displayed in the departmental
notice board for the students' general information. One of the total students
in the department, Ms Mahejabin Ahamed, responded to the call. She was
selected as the "Citizen Historian" by the 19|47 Archive management for
collecting her locality stories (Oral History). In addition, she was advised to
attend several "Oral History Workshops" conducted in the last quarter of
April 2018.
Ms Mahejabin Ahamed submitted her report on May 26, 2018. Being the
Citizen Historian, she collected oral history from Mr Prem Behary Thakur.
Summarised content of her dialogue as recorded on video portrayed as,
"Mr Prem Behari Thakur was born at the village named Bodgaon,
in Dinajpur district in West Bengal, India, on January 15, 1924.
His father was Mr Banku Behari Thakur, and his mother was Ms
Munmun Thakur. Prem Behari Thakur was a university passed
out student at the time of partition, and his age was twenty-four.
Later, he became a high school teacher with two marriages, but
none of his wives is not alive. He has one child, two grandsons,
one granddaughter, three great-grandsons and a great-
granddaughter. His ancestors were Maithili brahmins, and they
are zamindars of Purnia and Darvanga district in Bihar state,
India. He completed his education in Patna. He was a master of
English literature in 1942. He met Gandhiji in Patna, and he also
met Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose when he was studying in
Patna.
During 1924-1947 and after that time, the primary source of
income was cultivation. Cultivation of paddy, wheat, daals,
mustard was the primary cereals. Mr Prem did not see any
communal offence at his village and adjacent villages at the time
of partition or before the partition. In his village, every person
thought they were from different religious aspects never seen any
abusive situation, but suddenly they heard that they should live
together because the country is divided into two parts only based
on religious aspects. So, then they migrated from the village and
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 just crossed the river named Nagar, which was very closed to the
border of India and East Pakistan and started living at the village
named Goalgachh, West Bengal, INDIA.
After a long time, he came to Islampur, dist Uttar Dinajpur, West
Bengal, India. He teaches at Islampur High School. Later, he
established a school for children. After retirement, he was the
principal of that school that he was founded. Mr Thakur gained
some special awards from the West Bengal state government. He
is a righteous person; he shared many of his memories; he
shared much information about the economy and the
geographical position of that time. At last, I thank him for
contributing his memories and his precious time."
Ms Mahejabin Ahamed introduced herself in the summary as follows.
Mahejabin, a student of Library and Information Science at the
University of North Bengal, and I am twenty-three. Mr Prem
Behari Thakur is my neighbour, and from my childhood, I heard
about him. 1947 partition archive offered me an excellent job, I
liked it very much, and this opportunity taught me more about my
country and many things that I never heard about my country
and the geographical, economic, cultural etc. position of my
country at the time of partition. So, at last, I thank the 1947
partition archive for giving me the project.
The department functioned as a facilitator for Ms Mahejabin. Even though
she was oriented to 'Oral History Collection' methodologies by the
organisation (19|47 Archive) she worked for, the department helped her
grasp the methodological issues, develop research aptitude, and orient her
to overcome research bias. The faculties did this to imbibe her and other
students of the department for developing a quest for information
aggregation approaches.

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