Ramkrishna Mukherjee (14 November 1917 – 15 November 2015) was a scientist at the

Indian Statistical Institute The Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) is a public research university headquartered in Kolkata, India with centers in New Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai and Tezpur. It was declared an Institute of National Importance by the Government of India und ...

Kolkata Kolkata, also known as Calcutta ( its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River, west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary ...

, President of the

Indian Sociological Society Indian Sociological Society (ISS) is a professional body of sociologists in India. It publishes academic research journals, the ''Sociological Bulletin'' in English and the ''Bhartiya Samajshastra Sameeksha'' in Hindi language. History In Dec ...

(1973–75) and recipient of the Indian Sociological Society's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005. He is particularly well known for his study ''Dynamics of a Rural Society ''and his dialectical method in dealing with the study of Indian society.

Early life and education

He was born to a middle-class family in Kolkata, India, his father Satindra Nath being an engineer in the Indian Railways. He obtained MSc degree in 1941 from

University of Calcutta The University of Calcutta, informally known as Calcutta University (), is a Public university, public State university (India), state university located in Kolkata, Calcutta (Kolkata), West Bengal, India. It has 151 affiliated undergraduate c ...

and a PhD in 1948 from the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. From 1941 to 1944 he was an activist in the

Peasant movement A peasant movement is a social movement involved with the agricultural policy, which claims peasants rights. Peasant movements have a long history that can be traced to the numerous peasant uprisings that occurred in various regions of the wor ...

. Although he specialized in

human genetics Human genetics is the study of inheritance as it occurs in Human, human beings. Human genetics encompasses a variety of overlapping fields including: classical genetics, cytogenetics, molecular genetics, biochemical genetics, genomics, populatio ...

, he took lessons in

statistics Statistics (from German language, German: ', "description of a State (polity), state, a country") is the discipline that concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of data. In applying statistics to a s ...

from

Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis OBE, FNA, FASc, FRS (29 June 1893 – 28 June 1972) was an Indian scientist and statistician. He is best remembered for the Mahalanobis distance, a statistical measure, and for being one of the members of the fi ...

, founder of the ISI.

Career

In 1948 and 1949 he was Chief Research Officer to His Majesty's Social Survey,

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and had been Consultant to Government of

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

in 1949 and Consultant to the

London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...

in 1952. He began his career as a Professor at the Institute of Indian Studies at

Humboldt University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

from 1953 to 1957. He was

adjunct professor An adjunct professor is a type of academic appointment in higher education who does not work at the establishment full-time. The terms of this appointment and the job security of the tenure vary in different parts of the world, but the term is gen ...

Binghamton University The State University of New York at Binghamton (Binghamton University or SUNY Binghamton) is a public university, public research university in Binghamton metropolitan area, Greater Binghamton, New York, United States. It is one of the four uni ...

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

from 1977 to 1989. He spent most of his professional life with the Indian Statistical Institute from 1944 until his retirement in 1979.

Work

Along with DP Mukerji, he established the ''All India Sociological Conference (AISC)''. He worked as adviser for social science institutions and journals in India and abroad. With his work the theme of agrarian social structure and change was to re-appear in Indian Sociology only after a gap of nearly two decades in the late 1960s and 1970s. Among Indian sociologists, he stressed the importance of a

dialectic Dialectic (; ), also known as the dialectical method, refers originally to dialogue between people holding different points of view about a subject but wishing to arrive at the truth through reasoned argument. Dialectic resembles debate, but the ...

model for the study of Indian society and made systematic as well as

empirical Empirical evidence is evidence obtained through sense experience or experimental procedure. It is of central importance to the sciences and plays a role in various other fields, like epistemology and law. There is no general agreement on how t ...

studies using this model. This is exemplified by his book '' Rise and Fall of East India Company ''(1958) which is a contribution to economic and social history of the institutionalization of colonialism in India . He tried to develop an inductive methodology for social sciences. His research interests included genetics, studies in classification of families, rural society, historical sociology, problems of

acculturation Acculturation refers to the psychological, social, and cultural transformation that takes place through direct contact between two cultures, wherein one or both engage in adapting to dominant cultural influences without compromising their essent ...

Ramkrishna Mukherjee. ''The Problem of Uganda. A Study in Acculturation''. Abhandlungen der Deutschen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin. Klasse für Philosophie, Geschichte, Staats-, Rechts- und Wirtschaftswissenschaften. Jahrgang 1955 Nr. 2. Akademie-Verlag Berlin 1956. and

Social Indicators Research ''Social Indicators Research'', founded in 1974, is a journal that publishes research results dealing with the measurement of the quality of life. Editors () * Editor-in-chief: David Bartram, Ph.D., University of Leicester, UK * SINET selection ...

besides which he contributed over subjects like family, caste and class, agrarian relations in West Bengal, nationalism in Bangladesh, urbanization and social change and colonial exploitation by the

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

and in

Uganda Uganda, officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the ...

, and also contributed towards designing of National Sample Surveys. He had a Marxian and historical perspective with which he studied social institutions such as family and caste.

Awards and honors

Asiatic Society The Asiatic Society is an organisation founded during the Company rule in India to enhance and further the cause of " Oriental research" (in this case, research into India and the surrounding regions). It was founded by the philologist Will ...

Gold Medal for Anthropology (1981) *National Fellow,

Indian Council of Social Science Research The Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) is the national body overseeing research in the social sciences in India. It was established in New Delhi New Delhi (; ) is the Capital city, capital of India and a part of the Delh ...

from 1992 to 1994
Swami Pranavanand Education Award for Sociology
by University Grants Commission, New Delhi,(1985) * by Government of Madhya Pradesh * Member-Executive Committee,

International Sociological Association The International Sociological Association (ISA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to scientific purposes in the field of sociology and social sciences. It is an international sociological body, gathering both individuals and national sociol ...

, (ISA) (1976)

Personal life

Mukherjee married Prabhati Mukherjee, an academician, who died in 2008. They had two daughters, both of whom entered the academic field.

Selected publications

Books

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Felicitation volumes

* * * *

Selected journal articles

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

References

External links

''Special lectures commemorating Professor Ramkrishna Mukherjee, 28-29 March 2016''

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mukherjee, Ramkrishna 1917 births 2015 deaths Bengali Hindus Bengali writers Bengali historians 20th-century Bengalis Scholars from Kolkata Indian social sciences writers 20th-century Indian social scientists University of Calcutta alumni 20th-century Indian anthropologists Indian Marxist historians Indian sociologists Indian Marxist writers People from Baranagar 21st-century Indian anthropologists Academic staff of the Humboldt University of Berlin