For the purpose of celebrating 100 years of teaching anthropology in India, the Council of the Indian Anthropological Society undertook a programme of organizing a series of Special Lectures in the cherished memory of a selected group of distinguished anthropologists of India who immensely contributed to the growth of Indian anthropology in three of its sub-disciplines over the last 10 decades. Thus, in all 14 special lectures were organized by the Society in collaboration with 14 different institutions engaged in either teaching and/or research in Anthropology. However, we have received 11 articles written by senior anthropological scholars for publication in this book. The distinguished anthropologists whose life and academic contributions are portrayed in this book are: B. K. Roy Burman, B.N. Saraswati, U. Deka, P.K. Bhowmik, L.P. Vidyarthi, P.K. Ganguly, G. Sarana, D.P. Mukherjee, B.N. Banerjee, D.K. Bhattacharya and A. Basu. It is expected that this rich collection of papers should be of much help to all serious students of anthropology, providing them with enough motivating spirit to work towards the advancement of anthropology. About the Author: Subir Biswas is the founder Head of the Department of Anthropology, West Bengal State University. He was also one of the founder faculty of the Department of Anthropology, North Bengal University. He has to his credit several research projects of UGC, ICSSR, CWS (NBU), UGC-IUC Associateship at IIAS, Shimla; and successfully guided 9 doctoral and 2 post-doctoral scholars. He has published ten edited books as well as several research articles. At present, he is the General Secretary of the Indian Anthropological Society. Barun Mukhopadhyay is a retired Professor of Biological Anthropology Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. He remained engaged in research on demographic aspects and socio-cultural determinants of health and health care of the tribal populations of Sikkim-Darjeeling Himalaya since 1980s. His other major areas of research interest are: biocultural dimensions of ageing, ethno-biology, as well as bioethics and research ethics. He has many publications in international and national journals including edited volumes. Currently, he is serving as the Research Director of The Indian Anthropological Society. Rajat Kanti Das, formerly Professor and U.G.C. Emeritus Fellow in the Department of Anthropology, Vidyasagar University, West Bengal, has a long experience of teaching and research in different capacities. He has a number of publications in the form of books, research papers and articles on various topics of anthropological significance. At present, he is the President of the Indian Anthropological Society and is the editor of the ‘Journal of the Indian Anthropological Society’.