Anindita Ghoshal

Professor

Anindita Ghoshal is a Professor of History whose research focuses on peripheral communities and the histories of diverse linguistic, religious, ethnic, and socio-culturally marginalised communities of Eastern and Northeastern India and Bangladesh. Her academic interests include Partition, refugees, migration, borders and borderlands, citizenship, displacement, identity, memory, ethnicity, and the history of Bangladesh and Northeast India.

After teaching at Rishi Bankim Chandra College and Diamond Harbour Women’s University for two decades, serving as Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, and Professor, she joined Presidency University as a Professor in the Department of History in September 2026. She has also taught as Guest Faculty at Jadavpur University and worked as a Research Associate at the School of Women’s Studies, Jadavpur University.

Her research has received support through several fellowships, grants, and awards, including the Charles Wallace Trust Fellowship (2024-15), the ICHR Academic and Foreign Travel Grant to the University of Cardiff (2013), the ‘Gautam Chattopadhyay Memorial Prize’ for Best Paper in the Modern India Section (2013), awarded by Paschimbanga Itihas Samsad, the Research-Writing Fellowship of the Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (2012), and an academic affiliation with scholarship from the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, Dhaka (2008).

She has undertaken research projects as both Principal Investigator and Co-Investigator. These include the AHRC-funded project Reckoning in Refugeedom: Refugee Voices in Modern History, 1919-1975 at the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures, University of Manchester (2018-21); the project Experiments and Experiences of Refugeehood: The Story of Camp and Colonies and Spatial Change in Northeastern India at the Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development, Guwahati, Assam (2017-18); and the UGC-funded project Communal Politics and Refugee Movement in West Bengal: 1946-1967 (2008). She has also worked as a consultant on projects concerning displaced refugees during the Bangladesh Liberation War for the National War of Liberation Trust, Dhaka, Bangladesh (2023); the Kolkata Virtual Partition Museum (2021-22); and the shared history of Northeast India and its neighbours at OKDISCD, Guwahati, Assam, funded by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Japan (2018-2019).

She has authored and edited several books and edited volumes. Her recent publications include Sharanarthi, Simanta ar Porichiti: Purbo o Purbottor Bharote Adhikar o Abasbhumir Brityantyo (2026); Refugee Voices in Modern Global History: Reckoning with Refugeedom, co-authored with Peter Gatrell, Katarzyna Nowak, and Lauren Banko (Oxford University Press, 2025); Prantik Manus o Paribortit Rastrabyabostha: Ostitwer Rajnitir Vinno Boyan (2024); Revisiting Partition: Division, Distress and Displacement in India (2022); and Refugee, Borders and Identities: Rights and Habitat in East and Northeast India (Routledge, 2021). She is currently co-editing the forthcoming A Handbook of Bangladesh: History, Politics and Culture with Sabiha Huq.

Her publications and scholarly contributions explore themes including refugeehood, forced migration, Partition, citizenship, statelessness, borders, displacement, memory, identity, ethnicity, and the experiences of marginal communities. Her journal articles have appeared in journals such as Social History, EPW, Strategic Analysis, and Diasporas: circulations, migrations, histoire. Her book chapters have appeared in volumes published by Routledge, Edward Elgar, and other academic presses, addressing subjects such as Bengali refugees in West Bengal and Assam, tribal consciousness in Tripura, refugee colonies in post-Partition Calcutta, the Bangladesh Liberation War, citizenship and the Chakmas, and Asian diaspora.

She has been invited to deliver lectures, keynote addresses, special lectures, and conference papers at universities and academic institutions in India and abroad. Her academic engagements include Penn State University, German Research Institute, Paris, University of Rome Tre, University of Cardiff, University of Manchester, University of Stirling, University of Basel, Leiden University, University of KwaZulu-Natal, University of Dhaka, Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, University of Victoria, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jadavpur University, and other institutions. Her recent presentations have addressed post-Partition cities, refugee voices, the Bangladesh Liberation War, migration, citizenship, statelessness, borders, and the histories of Northeast India.

Alongside her academic work, she has contributed to newspapers and public scholarship platforms, including Ananda Bazar Patrika, Ei Samay, Hindustan Times, Indian Express, The Telegraph, The Daily Star, The Daily Sun, The Daily Observer, and Dhaka Tribune. She has also contributed to public discussions on history, Partition, Bangladesh, refugees, citizenship, and contemporary political developments.

She is proficient in Bengali, English, Hindi, Sanskrit, and Sylheti. Her experience includes university teaching, administrative work, research, academic writing, fieldwork, oral history, analytical thinking, creative writing, communication, and coordination.

For further details, please refer to the concise CV available on this page.