Professor Mushirul Hasan was a former vice-chancellor of Delhi’s Jamia Millia Islamia. He is known for his work on Nehru, Gandhi and Jinnah.
New Delhi: Eminent historian and former vice-chancellor of Jamia Millia Islamia, Professor Mushirul Hasan, passed away Monday at the age of 69. He had been battling ill health since a recent accident.
One of India’s finest post-Independence historians, Hasan’s main area of study was the Muslim communities of northern India, and Partition.
He is fondly remembered by colleagues, students and the entire Jamia community as the ‘Shah Jahan of Jamia’, having been one of the most popular vice-chancellors of the university from 2004 to 2009. Before that, he had served Jamia in various capacities for 35 years — as a member of the faculty and as pro-VC.
Mohammad Shakir, who worked as Hasan’s assistant at Jamia for almost 20 years, said: “He was known as the ‘Shah Jahan of Jamia’ because of the unprecedented construction that he got done. The university campus that we see today, most of it is because of him.”
The buildings constructed in his time include the famous Dr Zakir Hussian Library, the Academy of Third World Studies, for which he also served as director for around 10 years, and a number of other academic and faculty blocks.
After his retirement, Hasan also served as director of the National Archives of India.
He is survived by wife professor Zoya Hasan, a noted political scientist and faculty member at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
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Following in father’s footsteps
Prof. Hasan’s father Mohibul Hasan, also a well-known historian, was one of Jamia’s founding fathers — he started the history department and was one of the first professors to teach at the university.
Following in his father’s footsteps, Hasan pioneered many initiatives at Jamia in his time as vice-chancellor, including the Faculty of Dentistry, the Centre for Jawaharlal Nehru Studies and the Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy.
Professor Hari Vasudevan, who teaches history at the University of Calcutta, remembers Hasan as one of the most prolific historians of his generation.
“Being the son of a famous historian, he came to history almost naturally. He focussed entirely on the freedom movement initially in his career,” said Vasudevan.
“His idea of writing history was very clear — he wanted to document things in greater detail, without politicising or ideologically affecting them. Prof. Hasan was not involved in methodological debates of history, he believed in writing the big picture on it.”
Hasan is known for his work on Nehru, Gandhi and Jinnah, and wrote five books on Partition. Academics of his generation say no other Indian historian has published the volume and quality of work Hasan has, and received national and international recognition.
The article has been corrected to reflect that Prof. Zoya Hasan is a political scientist, not a historian. The error is regretted.