E-Paper
This man has a passion for archaeology and excavation
THE LIST of his achievements is long. And still longer is his experience in archaeology and excavations which is helping him in contributing towards the development of Allahabad Museum.
THE LIST of his achievements is long. And still longer is his experience in archaeology and excavations which is helping him in contributing towards the development of Allahabad Museum.
Prof RK Verma, the chairman of Allahabad Museum, took charge on June 21, 2005. Since then, the museum is witnessing innovative and novel ways of development.
He is the first PhD in Archaeology from Allahabad University (AU). "After completing PhD in 1958, I served as a lecturer in AU till 1985. Prof HD Sakalia trained me in archaeology while I was doing my research under Prof GR Sharma.
The credit of establishing 'Pre-History' as a subject in AU goes to me", he said.
Prof Verma's initiative led to extension of the AU activities of excavations in Mirzapur, Sidhi, Shahdol, South Varanasi which were till then limited to Kaushambi. UGC granted the status of Advance Centre to Ancient History department of Allahabad University on account of the ongoing activities.
The credit of starting the museum at AU also goes to Prof Verma and according to him at present it is the best among other universities of the country.
Exploring the finer details of cave paintings was the exclusive venture of Prof Verma who along with Wakankar and Shyam Kumar Pandey did tremendous amount of work on the topic. However, Dr Jagdish Gupt also worked on it, he said.
"I played a significant role in all the excavations done by Allahabad University till 1985. The excavations of Ganga valley were done under the guidance of Prof GR Sharma. The experience in the field motivated me to open a new gallery on Ganga valley culture at the museum", he said.
Rewa University invited him for professorship in the year 1985. The urge to evolve led him to establish the Department of Ancient History, Culture and Archeology there. Besides he also set up a museum in Rewa University and served as Vice Chancellor thrice during his tenure there. "The countries like USA, UK, Russia, Thailand, Philippines invited me several times to impart lectures on Archaeology," said Prof Verma.
Besides being the lifetime member of Indian Archaeological Society, he was also elected as the president of Pre-historic Society of India.
Penning books on the subject of Archaeology in Hindi is the innovative effort of Prof Verma.
His industrious nature has won him the support of his colleagues and subordinates. Besides, his simplicity is the most significant part of his overall personality.
"I have multiple plans regarding the museum under which I am planning for total remodelling", he said.
"I am of the opinion that museum is not a zoo. It has a responsibility towards society. Our aim is to attract the masses so that they may know more about their cultural identity and heritage and should feel proud to call themselves Indian", he added.
