Murali Ranganathan wins VM Salgaocar Foundation scholarship

The VM Salgaocar Foundation, which established the residency scholarship, concentrates on philanthropic activities related to advancing education and learning and creating scholarships, fellowships, residencies, lectures, research grants, and awards in education, humanities, literature, and the environment.

This residency scholarship is designed for writers working on an ongoing book project centred on Goa, focusing on areas like history, culture, politics, environment, economy, or related topics. The program received over 30 applications from writers and scholars from various parts of India.

Ranganathan is the inaugural recipient of the Scholarship. He will receive a 30-day residency in Goa, accommodation, and an honorarium to conduct research for his book, The Discovery of Print in Goa.

In the pages of PrintWeek, Ranganathan has been delving into the dissemination of printing history in India, across different states, and throughout South Asia during the twentieth century. He has also been writing on topics related to book history and travelogues.

Furthermore, Ranganathan has extensively translated from Marathi, Gujarati, Hindi, and Urdu into English, with these translations being published independently as books and articles or forming part of his research.

Ranganathan focuses on non-English resources from this period and region in languages/scripts such as Marathi, Gujarati, Urdu, Hindi, Persian, and Portuguese. He has published two book-length translations: an 1863 urban biography of Mumbai from Marathi (Govind Narayan's Mumbai: An Urban Biography from 1863, Anthem Press, 2009) and a memoir of the First World War from Gujarati (The First World War Adventures of Nariman Karkaria: A Memoir, HarperCollins, 2022).

Speaking to PrintWeek, Ranganathan said that it has been a great privilege for him to explore the print history of India in the columns of PrintWeek for the last ten years. "Goa has a special place in Indian print history because the first Indian imprint was published in Goa in 1556. This primacy has been reflected in the numerous columns connected to Goan print, which I have written in PrintWeek. These include essays on Goan print practitioners such as JM Gonsalves, an artist-lithographer active in the 1830s (December 2017), profiles of Goan print historians such as AK Priolkar (July 2020) and the Gracias brothers (March 2023), and an article on the revival of print in Goa in the 1820s (October 2017).”

He added, “I look forward to the Salgaocar Foundation residency in Goa and hope to access rare Goan imprints during my research stint.”