Dattatray Balwant Parasnis (1870–1926) was a historian from Maharashtra, India, who lived during the British Raj days.

Parasnis had been granted a lifelong pension of two hundred rupees a month by the Government of Bombay.

[2] Parasnis was born on 27 November 1870 in a traditional middle-class Deshastha Brahmin family.

His book was based on interviews with Dhanodar Rao, adopted son of Rani Lakshmibai, who was still alive then.

[4] In 1918-1925, along with Charles Augustus Kincaid, he co-authored in three volumes, A History of the Maratha people.