“When ‘eminent historians’ were put in the dock: Romila Thapar and the collapse of Marxist monopoly”, First Post, May 25, 2026
“Sometimes the crisis of Indian historiography can be captured through a single viral clip.
In the video, eminent historian Romila Thapar confidently claims that Patanjali described the relationship between Brahmins and Sramanas as being like that between a snake and a mongoose. It is a striking image, perfectly suited to the Marxist interpretation of ancient Bharat as a perpetual battlefield of social conflict. There is, however, one problem: the passage does not exist in Patanjali’s Mahabhashya. As author Nityananda Mishra explains in the viral clip, Patanjali refers to Sramanas and Brahmins together only once, and even there the snake-mongoose analogy is absent. Interestingly, the same claim had appeared in Thapar’s earlier works, including Interpreting Early India (1992) and Cultural Pasts (2000).
This incident is important not merely because it reveals the truth about a disputed quotation. It is important because it raises uncomfortable questions about the authority exercised by certain schools of Indian historiography and the reluctance within parts of academia to subject “eminent” historians to the same scrutiny they routinely apply to others……”
Read full article at firstpost.com
