After completing his Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree in 1896 from Scottish Church College in Kolkata, he faced financial difficulties while working as a private tutor.

[3] He conducted anthropometric measurements and studied ancient texts to present an alternate thesis supporting a stronger Aryan lineage among Indians.

In 1919, Chanda joined the University of Calcutta as a Lecturer in Ancient Indian History and later became the head of the newly established Department of Anthropology.

[8] Chanda's research suggested that philosophical religions in India, including Upanishads, Buddhism, and Jainism, predate the Aryan influence and are rooted in the Indus Valley.

Some of the Harappans were devoted to ritual discipline and concentration, this was one of the preoccupations of at least some of their gods.” [11] Chanda's work focused on the collection and analysis of objective data, such as inscriptions, in order to construct a scientific' history of the region.

[12] Chanda's Gaudarajamala is considered to be the first scientific history of the region, and he carefully omitted classical legends and mythical characters whose presence could not be proven by hard evidence.

[2] Chanda expounded in his thesis by stating that, since India had different religious traditions, that were more contemplative, and reflecting peaceful calmness through the practice of dhyana Yoga.

[16] In his second monograph published in 1929 titled Survival of the Pre-historic Civilization of the Indus Valley, in this publication he substantially abandoned his earlier hypothesis of Aryan invasion.

[21] In 1934 Chanda embarked on a project to collect and investigate original documents bearing on the life of Raja Ram Mohan Roy, a Bengali social and religious reformer, often called the Father of the Indian Renaissance.

[23] He traced the origins of Sramanism back to pre-Vedic, pre-Aryan peoples and their practitioners of magic, suggesting that the practice of asceticism can be linked to the initiatory period of seclusion and abstinence observed by shamans.

He proposed that the Bengalis were derived from the homo alpinus type, a brachycephalic population with Aryan or Indo-European speech in the prehistoric period.

[2] Furthermore, Chanda's address highlighted the significant role played by the Durga-Kali cult in Bengal, noting that it has traditionally held sway over the renunciation practices of Sramanism.

[9] He published various monographs expounding his thesis about the practice of dhyana yoga in the pre-history, but he acknowledged that the archaeological evidence was lacking to support his hypothesis.

However, he later revised his hypothesis, envisioning a symbiotic relationship between immigrants and native populations, paving the way for the concept of a mixed Hindu civilization.