In a March 2021 interview with Scroll.in, historian VN Datta explains that he deliberately wrote about the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre without letting the nationalist story of the event crowd out local detail and the wider imperial setting. The interview, conducted by Nonica Datta and included with an updated edition of his 1969 book Jallianwala Bagh, is his own account of how he built that history.
Who is speaking and why it matters
Datta grew up in Amritsar, close to the Bagh. In the interview he says that the memories and stories of violence he heard as a child shaped his interest in the event. He wrote Jallianwala Bagh after working on an earlier local history, Amritsar: Past and Present (1967), and first published the book in 1969. These are his own statements about his background, not independently checked biographical facts.
Read the interview as a historian explaining his method and interpretation. It is not a neutral review of the evidence. Where it states specific findings about the 1919 events, those findings are his conclusions, and they are discussed separately below.
How the book was built
Datta describes a method that combined official inquiry records, private papers, and people’s memories. He says he sought a balance between professional historical investigation and personal empathy for the city where he grew up. The sources he names are set out below.
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| Source type | Specific material Datta names | What he says it contributed |
|---|---|---|
| Official inquiry records | Volumes VI and VII of the Disorders Inquiry Committee Evidence (the Hunter Committee evidence), found at the National Archives in New Delhi | Records he considered important for examining the events leading up to the massacre; he later edited these volumes |
| Rival inquiry | The Congress Punjab Inquiry Committee report | Compared against the Hunter Committee evidence |
| Private papers | The M. R. Jayakar papers | Private material used alongside official records |
| Survivor and witness testimony | Oral accounts from survivors and witnesses | Testimony about the event itself |
| Local knowledge | Interviews with local residents and family friends | Local circumstances and community memory |
| Local police records | Local police records as cited in the interview | The basis for his estimate of the death toll (see below) |
The comparison between the two inquiries is the methodological core of the account. Datta sets the official Hunter Committee evidence against the Congress-sponsored report, rather than treating either as a complete record on its own.
Moving beyond the nationalist frame
The central claim of the interview is about framing. Datta says he tried to examine the massacre without focusing solely on its provincial and nationalist dimensions, while keeping the wider imperial and regional setting in view. He argues that nationalist histories can absorb the event into the story of the national movement, and he wants local circumstances and local leaders to be examined alongside that national frame.
He does not argue that the massacre lacked national significance. He describes it as a turning point in Indian nationalism. His objection is to treating the national meaning as the only meaning worth studying.
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In the interview, Datta uses several contrasting axes to organise his approach. These are his framing choices, not a complete map of the field, and the interview does not show that they are the only productive ways to study the event.
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- Scale: local versus national.
- Evidence: archival documents versus oral testimony.
- Context: imperial, regional, provincial, and local settings.
Claims to read as Datta’s own conclusions
The interview contains several specific historical assertions. They should be read as Datta’s reported findings and interpretations, not as settled facts, and the interview does not test them against the archival record or against the work of other historians.
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- Death toll: Datta says that, based on local police records, about 700 people were killed. He describes figures on a plaque as exaggerated.
- Who was present and how the crowd formed: he gives his own account, which should be checked against the inquiry evidence he cites.
- Dyer’s intentions: he offers an interpretation of what Reginald Dyer intended, in answer to the interviewer’s question about how he would interpret Dyer’s action.
Anyone citing these points should attribute them to Datta and, where possible, compare them with the Hunter Committee volumes and other scholarship on the massacre.
Key quotations
The following sentences are reproduced verbatim from the interview.
- “I tried to understand the massacre, or what I also called a carnage, from various perspectives and steered it away from a sole focus on the provincial and nationalist dimension.” — VN Datta, historian.
- “In my book, I have tried to move away from a nationalist hagiography of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre.” — VN Datta, historian.
- “It’s not easy to craft a history of this tangled happening.” — VN Datta, historian.
Reading the book and the interview together
The physical book named in connection with the interview is Jallianwala Bagh: A groundbreaking history of the 1919 massacre by VN Datta. Penguin Books is credited for the excerpt published with the interview, which describes an updated edition that includes it. Editions, formats, and current availability change, so check the edition and stock with the publisher or a bookseller before buying.
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For a reader approaching the topic, the most useful sequence is to read the interview first to understand Datta’s method and the framing he is arguing against, then read the book itself for the full evidence and his reasoning. The Hunter Committee volumes he edited are the primary documents behind much of his account and are the natural next step for checking his claims.
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The interview is from 2021 and reflects Datta’s own account at that time. It is a clear statement of one historian’s approach, not a survey of current scholarship on the 1919 events.
Source: Scroll.in, “‘I tried to move away from a nationalist hagiography of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre’: VN Datta,” interview by Nonica Datta, published 22 March 2021.
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