NewDelhi: Anand Shanker Singh, an office-bearer of the RSS’s Akila Bharatheeya Itihasa Sankalana Yojana (ABISY) and principal of Iswar Saran Degree College in Allahabad, is set to become the new member-secretary of the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR).

The last appointment of historian Gopinath Ravindran, to the post was made under Manmohan Singh lead UPA government in its second term, but from the last one and a half year the has been lying vacant as he resigned halfway through his term in June 2015, over differences with ICHR’s current head Y S Rao on its decision to disband the advisory committee of its journal comprising 21 historians, including Romila Thapar and Irfan Habib.

Anand Shankar Singh was selected by a panel that included Y S Rao. His candidature has the approval from the union HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar and the appointment will be announced soon.

Anand Singh is currently vice-president of the Uttar Pradesh chapter of ABISY called Akhil Bhartiya Itihaas Sankalan Samiti. Earlier he has served as principal of Iswar Saran Degree College, a constituent college of Allahabad University since 2005, and specializes in Sub Continent numismatics and paleography and ancient Sub Continent socio-economic history.“I have worked on the inscriptions and coins found in Mathura and Kaushambi,” he said in a communique to an English vernacular.

He is not the only appointment from the Sangh Pariwar into the ICHR since NDA-II came to power, as Council members Narayan Rao, Ishwar Sharan Vishwakarma, Nikhilesh Guha and the ICHR boss himself are associated with the RSS’s history wing.

At the time when he was elevated to the council, Anand Singh was serving as  vice president of ABISY, Vishwakarma was the All-India general secretary, Guha headed the West Bengal chapter of ABISY, and Rao was the chief of the Andhra Pradesh chapter. The ABISY’s official website states that its objective is to write “Bharatheeya history from a Indian nationalism perspective”.

Anand Singh reportedly said that he had no intimation yet of his appointment. “ICHR’s objective is to improve the research and understanding of history and take it to the common man. If given an opportunity (to serve as its member-secretary), I will also work on these lines. We will try to open more regional centres,” he maintained.

When he was asked about his priorities by the media persons he stated “I think work should be done on the stratification and dating of Puranas (ancient Sub continent literature). For instance, when we talk of Vayu Purana, it is generally said that it dates somewhere between second century BC to second century AD. We need to work on this and it is a big job. If this can happen, it will be a big contribution.”