Research interests lie at the intersection of colonial infrastructure, labour history, and the political geography of Northeast India. Areas of focus include the history of road-making and railway construction; the development of aviation in South and Southeast Asia; labour mobilisation in colonial transport networks; military and war history; and the longue durée of connectivity in India's northeastern frontier.

• PhD , 2018 , University of Delhi
• MPhil , 2012 , University of Delhi
• MA , 2009 , University of Delhi

Santosh Hasnu is an Assistant Professor in the Department of History, Hansraj College, University of Delhi, where he has been on permanent faculty since November 2022. He has been associated with the college as a teacher since 2013. His doctoral research, completed at the University of Delhi, examined the history of transport systems — waterways, roads, railways and aviation — across colonial Northeast India. His published work appears in journals including the Economic and Political Weekly and Bengal, Past and Present, and in edited volumes published by Palgrave Macmillan, SAGE, and Brill. He has presented research at international conferences held at Harvard University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, EHESS Paris, and the University of Zurich.

• History of Modern China, 1840–1950s
• History of India, 1858–1947
• History of India, c. 1200–1550
• Colonialism and Nationalism in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century India
• Basics of Historical Research Methodology

Member, Centre for Tribal Studies, University of Delhi.

Convener, North-East Cell, Hansraj College.  

'Coolie Labor, Tea Planters and Transport in colonial India', book chapter in Global Commodity Chains and Labor Relations, edited by Andrea Komlosy & Goran Music (Brill Publication: Leiden, 2021). https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004448049_009

'Colonial state and Annexation of Cachar in a Strategic Frontier of British Bengal', book chapter in State vs. Society in Northeast India: History, Politics  and the Everyday,  edited by G. A marjit Sharma (SAGE Publication: New Delhi, 2021).

‘Disciplining the hill tribes into coolie labor for road building’, book chapter in The Palgrave Handbook of Bondage and Human Rights in Africa and Asia, edited by Gwyn Campbell & Alessandro Stanziani (Palgrave Macmillan Publication: New York, 2020). https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95957-0_7

‘Road Construction in North-East Frontier of India, 1820s-1830s’, book chapter in a book Road Communication in North East India and Beyond: Bridging Culture and People (Concept Publishing Company: New Delhi, 2018).

“Inception of Aviation Routes between India and China”, Economic and Political Weekly Journal, Volume 52, Issue No.33, 19 August 2017. https://www.epw.in/journal/2017/33/commentary/inception-aviation-routes-between-india-and-china.html

‘Aviation in India: A Historical Overview,’ Shodkosh, June 2024, 5 (6), pp. 1894-1898. https://doi.org/10.29121/shodhkosh.v5.i6.2024.2745

‘The cross-cultural connections enabled by WW II:A case study of British India & the Chinese Nationalist Government,’ paper presented at the International Seminar organized by South Asia Institute, Harvard University in collaboration with Max Weber Forum for South Asian Studied, Delhi held at IIC Annex, Delhi on 18 October 2024.

"Local Girls and American G.I.s. in Assam during Second World War," paper presented at the 2nd Annual Workshop on Writing Global History: Perspectives from Global South, organized by SAGHN, held at University of Delhi, 8-9 March 2024.

“Labour Circulation and Transport System in colonial Assam”, paper presented at the 52nd International Conference for Labour and Social History, held at Steyr, Upper Austria, 15-17 September 2016.

“Air Transport from India: Diplomacy and Business in WWII”, paper presented at an International Workshop “The Indian Predicament: South Asia in WWII”, held at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, from June 5-6, 2016.

“Colonial Road Construction and Labour Mobilisation in Nineteenth Century Northeast Frontier of India”, paper presented at a workshop held at Collège de France, Salle Claude Lévi-Strauss, Paris, from 30 September – 2 October 2015.

“Politics of Road Building in Colonial Expansion into Northeast India” presented for the panel “Reinterpreting South Asian state-formation: communication-spatialities and state structures” in the 23rd European Conference on South Asia, held on 23-26 July 2014 at University of Zurich, Switzerland.

Delivered a lecture titled ‘Infrastructure and Public Works as Instruments of state-making in the eastern Himalayas’ for an online certificate course on Academic Writing, Research Methodology and New Frontiers of Research for Humanities and Social Sciences organized by Student Learning Centre, IQAC in collaboration with the Department of English, Hansraj College on 15 January 2022.

Delivered a lecture at the Faculty Development Programme on New Perspectives on the History of North East India Series-II (02-06 November 2020), organized by Rajiv Gandhi University, Arunachal University. 

Delivered a talk titled “A Historical Look at the People of North East India” talk delivered at Seminar Room, Hansraj College, organized by Samanvaya, B.A Programme Society on 25 February 2016.

Delivered a talk titled “Recasting Colonial Roads as ‘Public Works’ in Northeast India, c.1824-1891” at Nehru Memorial Museum Library (NMML), New Delhi on 20 April 2015.

Presented a paper on ‘Recruiting the Khasi & Garo hill peoples as Labour Corps for the WW I’ at the International Conference on ‘India and First World War’ held at Nehru Memorial Museum Library, New Delhi, from 27—28 November 2018.

Presented a paper on ‘Border Roads and Imperial Expansion of Late British and Qing Empire: A Case Study of the Lohit Valley Road’ at the International Conference on Northeast India & Southeast Asia: Exploring Continuities held at Ambedkar University, Delhi, from 25-26 October 2018.

Participated as an Indian Delegation Member to Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu in China with an objective for broadening the understanding between Indian and Chinese institutions, faculty as well as researchers organized by Embassy of People’s Republic of China in India between July and August 2017.

Participated and presented a paper at Summer School on “Labour, Coercion and Rights, Local Bondage in Global Perspective” held at EHESS, Paris from 13–16 June 2017, organized by Research University Paris (PSL).

Participated at India-China Corridor Spring School on ‘Modern Empires, Flows, Environments and Livelihoods’ on 25-26 March 2017, held at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Guwahati (Assam).

Participated in a workshop “Security in a Globalized World – New and Emerging Challenge” as part of the U21 Masters Intensive Module 2011 of the University of Birmingham, University of Delhi & University of Melbourne, organized at the University of Delhi from January 31 – 4 February 2011.