Romesh Chunder Dutt, CIE (Calcutta August 13, 1848 — Baroda November 30, 1909), or R. C. Dutt, was a Bengali writer, civil servant, economic historian, and translator of Ramayana and Mahabharata. He was president of the Indian National Congress in 1899.

Dutt was born August 13, 1848 into a Kayasth Bengali family distinguished for literary and academic achievements. His parents were Thakamani and Isam Chunder Dutt. His father, Isam, was a Deputy Collector of Bengal, whom Romesh accompanied on official duties. He was educated in Bengali District schools, then at Hare School, founded by the philanthropist, David Hare, in Kolkata. Romesh's uncle, Shoshee Chunder Dutt, an accomplished writer, became his guardian in 1861. "He used to sit at night with us and our favorite study used to be pieces from the works of the English poets." He entered perhaps the best school in Bengal, the University of Calcutta, Presidency College in 1864, then passed the First Arts examination in 1866, second in order of merit, and won a scholarship. While still a student in the B.A. class, without his family's permission he and two friends left for England in 1868. Only one Indian, Satyendra Nath Tagore, had ever before qualified for the Indian Civil Service, but that was Romesh's objective. For a long time before, only British officers had been appointed to covenanted posts.

At University College, London, Dutt continued to study British writers. He studied law at Middle Temple, London, was called to the bar, and qualified for the Indian Civil Service in the open examination in 1869.

In 1871 Dutt entered the Indian Civil Service, or ICS, as an Assistant Magistrate of Alipur. His official career was a test and a proof of the liberal promise of equality to all her Majesty's subjects "irrespective of color and creed" in Queen Victoria's Proclamation of November 1, 1858, which often contrasted with an implicit distrust of Indians, especially from those in positions of authority within the elite colonial administrative system.

A famine in Meherpur, District of Nadia in 1874 and another in Dakhin Shahbazpur (Bhola District) in 1876, followed by a disastrous cyclone, required emergency relief and economic recovery operations, which Dutt managed successfully. By December, 1882, Dutt achieved his appointment to the executive branch of the Service, the first Indian to achieve executive rank. He served as administrator for Backerganj, Mymensingh, Burdwan, Donapur, and Midnapore. He became Burdwan's District Officer in 1893, Commissioner of Burdwan Division in 1894, and Divisional Commissioner for Orissa in 1895.

As Dutt's biographer commented, "In the absence of even the rudiments of representative institutions entry into the higher Civil Services presented the only opportunity to an Indian to influence the government of his own country." He sat for a time in the Bengal Legislative Council. Although he won high praise for his administrative work, and the Companionship of the Indian Empire was awarded him in 1892, Dutt did not always agree with official views on the causes of poverty in India or on the problems of administration.

As his official recommendations and reports reflected, Dutt was especially troubled by the lack of assured tenants' rights or rights of transfer for those who tilled the land. He considered the land taxes to be ruinous, a block to savings, and the source of famines. He also felt the effectiveness of administrators was limited by the absence of representative channels for the concerns of the population being governed. He retired from the ICS as the Commissioner of Orissa in 1897 while only 49 years of age. Retirement freed him to enter public life and pursue writing.

Poverty and low wages were among the indirect products of colonial rule. Romesh Dutt traced a decline in standards of living to the nineteenth-century deindustrialization of the subcontinent and the narrowing of sources of wealth which followed:

India in the eighteenth century was a great manufacturing as well as great agricultural country, and the products of the Indian loom supplied the markets of Asia and of Europe. It is, unfortunately, true that the East Indian Company and the British Parliament ... discouraged Indian manufactures in the early years of British rule in order to encourage the rising manufactures of England . . . millions of Indian artisans lost their earnings; the population of India lost one great source of their wealth.

Radhakamal Mukerjee and Romesh Dutt directed attention to the deepening internal differentiation of Indian society appearing in the abrupt articulation of local economies with the world market, accelerated urban-rural polarization, the division between intellectual and manual labor, and the toll of recurrent devastating famines.

Dutt was appointed a Lecturer in Indian History in the University of London in 1898, shortly after his retirement from the Civil Service. However, he returned to India in 1904 to become Revenue Minister for the state of Baroda for three years. He came back to India again in 1908 as a member of the Decentralisation Commission.

* Bengal Renaissance

* Three Years in Europe (1872) * The Peasantry of Bangal, being a View of their Condition under the Hindu, the Mahomedan, and the English Rule, and a Consideration of the Means Calculated to Improve their Future Prospects, Calcutta, Thacker, Spink; London: Trübner (1874); ed. Narahari Kaviraj, Calcutta, Manisha (1980) * The Literature of Bengal: a Biographical and Critical History from the Earliest Times, Closing with a Review of Intellectual Progress under British Rule in India. (1877); Calcutta, T. Spink (1895); 3rd ed., Cultural Heritage of Bengal Calcutta, Punthi Pustak (1962). * Mādhabī kaṅkaṇa in Bengali (1879) * Rajput jivan sandhya (1879); Pratap Singh: The Last of the Rajputs, A Tale of Rajput Courage and Chivalry, tr. Ajoy Chandra Dutt. Calcutta: Elm Press (1943); Allahabad, Kitabistan, (1963)]]. * Rig Veda translation into Bengali (1885): R̥gveda saṃhitā / Rameśacandra Dattera anubāda abalambane ; bhūmikā, Hiraṇmaẏa Bandyopādhyāẏa, Kalakātā , Harapha (1976). * Hinduśāstra : naẏa khaṇḍa ekatre eka khaṇḍe / Rameśacandra Datta sampādita, Kalikātā, Satyayantre Mudrita, 1300; Niu Lāiṭa, 1401 [1994]. * A History of Civilization in Ancient India, Based on Sanscrit Literature. 3 vols. Thacker, Spink and Co.; Trübner and Co., Calcutta-London (1890) Reprinted, Elibron Classics (2001). * A Brief History of Bengal, S.K. Lahiri (1893). * Lays of Ancient India: Selections from Indian Poetry Rendered into English Verse. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner (1894); Rupa (2002). ISBN 8171678882 * Reminiscences of a Workman's Life: verses Calcutta, Elen Press, for private circulation only (1896); Calcutta: n.p. (1956). * England and India: a record of progress during a hundred years, 1785-1885 (1897); New Delhi, India : Mudgal Publications, 1985. * Mahabharata: the epic of India rendered into English verse, London: J. M. Dent and Co., 1898. Maha-bharata, The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse Project Gutenberg, on line. * The Ramayana: the epic of Rama rendered into English verse, London: J.M. Dent and Co., 1899. 194 p. * The Ramayana and the Mahabharata: the great epics of ancient India condensed into English verse, London: J.M. Dent and Co., 1900. Reprint 1910. xii, 335p. Also, Everyman’s Library, New York, Dutton (1929).Internet Sacred Texts Archive. * Shivaji; or the morning of Maratha life, tr. by Krishnalal Mohanlal Jhaveri. Ahmedabad, M. N. Banavatty (1899). Also: tr. by Ajoy C. Dutt. Allahabad, Kitabistan (1944). * Open Letters to Lord Curzon on Famines and Land Assessments in India, London, Trübner (1900) 2005 ed. Adamant Media Corporation, Elibron Classics Series, ISBN 1-4021-5115-2. * The lake of palms. A story of Indian domestic life, translated by the author. London, T.F. Unwin (1902); abridged by P.V. Kulkarni, Bombay, n.p. (1931). * The Economic History of India Under Early British Rule. From the Rise of the British Power in 1757 to the Accession of Queen Victoria in 1837. Vol. I. London, Kegan Paul, Trench Trübner (1902) 2001 edition by Routledge, ISBN 0415244935. On line, McMaster ISBN 8185418012 * The Economic History of India in the Victorian Age. From the Accession of Queen Victoria in 1837 to the Commencement of the Twentieth Century, Vol. II. London, Kegan Paul, Trench Trübner (1904) On line. McMaster ISBN 8185418012 * Indian poetry. Selected and Rendered into English by R.C. Dutt London: J. M. Dent (1905). * The Slave Girl of Agra: An Indian Historical Romance, Based on Madhavikankan. London: T.F. Unwin (1909); Calcutta, Dasgupta (1922). * Vanga Vijeta; in translation, Todar Mull: The Conqueror of Bengal, trans. by Ajoy Dutt. Allahabad: Kitabitan, 1947. * Sachitra Guljarnagar, tr. by Satyabrata Dutta, Calcutta, Firma KLM (1990)

* J. K. Ratcliffe "A Note on the Late Romesh C. Dutt", The Ramayana and the Mahabharata condensed into English Verse (1899) at Internet Sacred Texts Archive * J. N. Gupta, Life and Works of Romesh Chunder Dutt", (1911) Digital Library of India, Bangalore, barcode 2990100070832 On line. * R. C. [Rabindra Chandra Dutt, Romesh Chunder Dutt, (1968) Internet Archive, Million Books Project] * "Selected Poetry of Romesh Chunder Dutt (1848-1909)," Representative Poetry Online, University of Toronto (2002) On line. * M Mofakharul Islam, "Dutt, Romesh Chunder", Banglapedia.com * Bhabatosh Datta, "Romesh Chunder Dutt", Congress Sandesh, n.d. * Shanti S. Tangri, "Intellectuals and Society in Nineteenth-Century India", Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 3, No. 4 (Jul., 1961), pp. 368-394. * Pauline Rule, The Pursuit of Progress: A Study of the Intellectual Development of Romesh Chunder Dutt, 1848-1888'' Editions Indian (1977)