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The most important formative years of my student life were spent in Presidency College with teachers like Taraknath Sen, Sailen Sen, Amal Bhattacharya and Arun Dasgupta.
Next would be my days in Cambridge. I had completed my Master’s from Jadavpur University and Cambridge offered me a PhD. But I wanted to do a second bachelor in arts instead as the BA programme in Cambridge was more expansive. I have never regretted the decision.
Muriel Bradbrooke and Anne Barton taught us Shakespeare, Gillian Beer Keats and John Beer Coleridge. In Cambridge, a student is free to attend any lecture from any discipline. So, for Greek tragedy I used to attend the classics lectures, for my interest in philosophy I attended the classes in the philosophy faculty. The campus offered a full life — going to the river to cheer the women’s boat club team, mulled wine and cheese in the junior common room in the evenings….
JU WAS A BIT LIKE CAMBRIDGE
When I returned in 1973, JU offered me part-time classes, starting with lectures on Greek tragedy for Master’s students. Next year, I got a full-time post at Loreto College. By then, JU was the best English department in town. So I returned on a permanent post in January 1975.
With its lush greenery, little wooden bridge and ducks waddling in the jheel, JU in those days was a bit like Cambridge. In the first two batches I taught were my later-day colleagues Swapan Chakravorty and Amlan Dasgupta and Sujata Sen. So was Souvik Bhattacharya, who walked up to me after a vice-chancellors’ meeting some years ago to remind me that I used to teach their engineering class.
Not only was the JU syllabus updated, I also had colleagues like Jasodhara Bagchi and Malini Bhattacharya. Our head, Kitty Scoular Dutta, took personal interest in our research and publication.
In 1980, the governor T.N. Singh was forming the university council in a politically charged atmosphere. Word must have reached him that I was an independent-minded person. He named me the chancellor’s nominee. I served the council for the next five years. I was the only woman and far younger than the others. I was able to identify areas where injustice was being done and if I was overruled, wrote long dissenting notes. People actually went to court and won cases on the basis of those notes.
In 1977-78, I took leave and went back to Cambridge on a British Council scholarship to work on Milton’s astronomy. This would be the first of many such returns to Cambridge, which became my second home. I became a Visiting Fellow at Clare Hall, Cambridge, and later became an elected Life Member.
In 1987, as a member of the UGC’s panel of experts in English and Foreign Languages, I learnt of a new Department of Special Assistance grant. I came out of the meeting and called Jasodharadi, then our department head. Jasodharadi put together the application with my help and very soon we became the first English department in the country to get DSA status.
I was head of the department from 1999 to 2001, after which I joined the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) panel.
BIRTH OF CSRL
I feel the period around 1992-93 were the department’s best years in terms of the quality of faculty and students. From the late ’80s, there would be groups of students who would chat in my room after university hours debating Keats, Shelley and even fundamental questions like why study literature. There was no scope for students to present papers in those days.
When Kelvin Everest (now the pro-vice chancellor of Liverpool University) came visiting, I requested the British Council to lend him to JU for half a day so that he could listen to the students reading papers. Later he told me: “They are outstanding. Do something for them.” That’s how I thought of a centre dedicated to the study of Romantic literature which would give our students access to the latest publications. I went around fund-raising, approaching corporate contacts many of whom balked at the thought of spending on literature. I remember telling one of them: “If you don’t, one day you will mention Michelangelo and your young recruits will think it’s a computer program.” He wrote me a cheque instantly.
But the then vice-chancellor said that outside money would not be allowed in. So I was forced to make the centre a private one. My husband Sudipto bought an apartment and moved his law chamber out of the ground floor of our residence to make way for our library. One has to be fortunate to get such support.
I ordered a round table for the library as I wanted no artificial divide between teachers and students at the meetings.
Students had an equal say in policy matters. Another objective of setting up the centre was inviting the top scholars from the UK and the US so they get a chance to hear our best students and help them when they apply later. Thus a whole lot of students from the centre went to study abroad.
When the Centre for Studies in Romantic Literature (CSRL) was born in 1994, John and Gillian Beer were the guest speakers. Over the years, visitors such as Nicholas Roe from the University of St. Andrews have become personal friends.
THE PRESIDENCY CHALLENGE
I did not want to continue at JU beyond 60. I wanted to write a book on Paradise Lost and science. When the Presidency vice-chancellorship offer came, we were starting on a tour of the French Alps and I was undecided. But Sudipto said: “This is Presidency! Why are you hesitating?”
The biggest challenge was faculty. I could have continued with the old set but this was a chance to get world-class people. I went to each department and told the teachers that I could not guarantee that they would make the cut but I trusted them to carry on earnestly till then. Motivation must have been difficult but no one failed me.
The other challenge was finance. Buildings were crumbling. I asked for Rs 50 crore for Baker Building, I got Rs 3 crore.
The recruitment was a big success. If the head of the physics department then [Somak Raychaudhury] is now heading the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, that says something about the quality of the faculty we got. I deliberately did not include local scholars in the interview panels as there could be pressure on them.
The other success was building team spirit. We had a monthly meeting where I shared with the teachers every administrative detail like funds being raised. The biology faculty was so outstanding that I presented a booklet with their profiles and got massive funding from the government’s department of biotechnology.
I dispensed with the pass classes and introduced general education. As part of that, Somak and I taught a joint class on space, time and the universe which was open to all students.
Before my two-and-a-half-year tenure ended, I was able to draft Presidency’s first statutes and service rules, hold the university’s first convocation and set up the vice-chancellor’s fund for excellence in which crores were raised from alumni.
A NEW CHAPTER
I had settled down to write my next book on anxiety of space in Romantic poetry when the call came in July 2015 from the founder trustees of Ashoka University, seeking help to shape the university as principal academic advisor. I thought it would be a six-month job. But a year on, I have ended up taking on an additional full-time role as the dean of faculty and research, guiding the university’s research plans and recruitment. In Calcutta, I had to fight for approvals. Here there is so much flexibility and support. Only my book remains unwritten.
THREE ACADEMICIANS YOU LOOK UP TO
Alison Richard, former vice-chancellor, Cambridge: I learnt from her how to balance staying grounded — she cycled to office — and having huge aspirations for the university.
Gillian Beer, former president of Clare Hall, Cambridge: A superb academic and institution builder.
Christopher Ricks: He taught me to be confident even while challenging top scholars. As a student, when I said Alastair Fowler, considered the last word on Milton, was wrong in one interpretation in Book IX of Paradise Lost, Ricks made me write to him. There was an exchange of letters between us. In the preface to his second edition of Paradise Lost, Fowler later wrote that he “learnt astronomy” from Malabika Sarkar of Calcutta.
THREE THINGS STUDENTS DON’T KNOW ABOUT YOU
♦ I hate early mornings. I am never at my best in early morning classes.
♦ I must listen to some music in the morning, be it Mohd. Rafi or Mozart or Tagore.
♦ Cricket used to be my passion. I have even rescheduled classes to watch Pataudi or Gavaskar play.
THE AWARD GIVERS:
Rupali Basu
Malabika Sarkar, the first lady vice-chancellor of Presidency University, is an inspiring personality and I was honoured to present her with the first SHE Award in the field of Education. She has successfully merged diverse interests like the poetry of John Milton, the History of Science and Romantic Studies. She may emerge as the role model for women scholars and educationists of the future.
Suman Ghosh
I was very impressed with the entire endeavour. The basic premise of She Awards was extremely novel and important. And it was a humbling experience (more so as a Presidencian) to give the award to a person of the calibre of Malabika Sarkar.
As told to Sudeshna Banerjee
Malabika Sarkar taught me.... Tell t2@abp.in
