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“…I want to use this opportunity of expressing my cordial and sincere thanks to the Vice-Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru University, Professor B.B. Bhattacharya, who approved the idea of inviting me to JNU. “I am specially obliged to the Director of the Institute of Advanced Study – Professor Aditya Mukherjee, without whom my presence in India wouldn’t have been so successful and fruitful. He was my guide in the world of Indian historians and their newest publications on Indian history. I gained a lot from our discussions on various problems of 20th century Indian history, which was of great importance to me, as I was completing a revised version of the Moscow University Text-book “The History of India (20th – beginning of the 21st cent.)” and “Indian Political Thought Reader”. His energy and skill in organizing the Institute are really remarkable and surprising. “…I should specially stress that the administrative staff of the Institute supplied me with everything which is necessary to a research fellow to start his life and work in a new place. I am very grateful to all members of the administrative staff for their warm assistance. I’d like to thank Mr. P.K. Jain, Administrative Officer, JNIAS, JNU, for his ready and willing help and valuable advice. “The administration of the Institute of Advanced Study gave me a great chance to visit JNU and meet professors, lecturers and students, specializing in Indian History and Politics. I am very much obliged for an opportunity to get acquainted with leading specialists in Indian History and to discuss current political and economic issues which are estimated to be most crucial and characteristic of the latest developments in India. “…I had a chance to be present at the International Seminar on ‘Mahatma Gandhi and the Quest for a Just Society’, which was organized by the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library. I met distinguished scholars and leaders of popular movements and got fresh and valuable impressions on the developments in Indian social life and academic activities. I am really indebted to Professor Mridula Mukherjee, Centre for Historical Studies, JNU, and Director of Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, who invited me to the seminar, as well as to the presentation of the book of Professor Bipan Chandra “Indian National Movement” and gave me a chance to get acquainted with the library and archive matgerials, including photo section. It was a very valuable experience and the library produced a great impression on me. I visited Nehru Memorial Museum, as well as National Gandhi Museum, Indira Gandhi Memorial Museum, National Museum. I had a chance to collect materials for the main courses of lectures, that I deliver in Moscow State University: “The History of India in 20th – beginning of 21st cent.” and “The History of Indian Political Thought”, for the abovementioned Text-book and Reader. “…I consider my visit to be very important and instrumental to further development of long-term cooperation with academic circles of Indian Republic and to further discussions of the prospects of scholarly exchange programmes between our Institute of Asian and African Studies (Moscow State University) and Jawaharlal Nehru University.”
Professor Alexandra
Safronova,
Head, Faculty of History, Institute of Asian and African Studies, |