OriginA N Sinha Institute of Social Studies, Patna was established by the Government of Bihar in memory of Dr. Anugrah Narayan Sinha, one of the makers of modern Bihar and ardent follower of Mahatma Gandhi since Champaran Satyagraha. It was inaugurated on the 31st of January, 1958, by Desh Ratna Dr. Rajendra Prasad, the then President of India. Later it was made a statutory autonomous body through legislature on the 8th October, 1964, under the Anugraha Narayan Sinha Institute of Social Studies Act 1964. The Institute is governed by the Board of Control and funded by the Dept of Education, Govt of Bihar and ICSSR, New Delhi.
Objectives
1. To undertake teaching and research in social sciences;
2. To undertake study of specific problems, if and when required by the State Government or the Central Government or any other agency;
3. To provide for journals, books, pamphlets and other such materials as may be deemed necessary;
4. To organise lectures, seminars and conferences, and
5. To undertake other allied activities.
Research Area
The research interest of the institute broadly focuses on development and change, with special reference to Bihar and the Eastern region. Efforts have usually been made towards studying the mechanisms and processes of change in the wake of development, within appropriate theoretical and conceptual framework. Issues and problems within the above framework are identified and analysed towards finding their solutions.
Accordingly, researches of theoretical and empirical nature broadly diagnostic, evaluative and prescriptive nature, having relevance to the economy, society, polity of the country in general and the state of Bihar in particular, have been studied by the different faculties of the Institute. Special attention is paid to the study of the under-privileged and the rural poor, especially the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes and women, and other socially and economically disadvantaged groups, within the disciplines of Economics, Sociology and Social Anthropology, Social Psychology, Political Science and Public Administration, Social Geography, Non- Violence and Peace and Statistics. The Institute has multidisciplinary operational character and approach.