Ishwar Chandra and Ishwar

In his article Vidyasagar ki nastik chhilen (Was Vidyasagar an atheist?), scholar Asit Kumar Bandyopadhyay regrets that reticence as he tries to answer the question he poses to himself. The accusation of atheism – or its variant suspicion that he secretly harbored faith in some form of Christianity – was often used by conservative Bengali kulin Brahmins to deride Vidyasagar who, in addition to successfully legalizing remarriage of widows, aggressively went after practices dear to the orthodox establishment such as polygamy and child marriage. So apart from natural curiosity, the question had practical relevance when Vidyasagar was alive.

Was Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar an atheist? Or was he a believer who had given up on organized religion? Dipanjan, while attempting to answer these questions argues that it would be unfair to classify Vidyasagar merely as a ‘Hindu’ or a ‘Bengali’ reformer.

Hat Tip: Bong’o'pondit