Category: Hindus’ History

From: stop-corruption-worldwide@googlegroups.com [mailto:stop-corruption-worldwide@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Om B Sent: Monday, July 11, 2011 9:27 PM To: Stop Corruption Worldwide Subject: [scw] WHY I KILLED GANDHI!!! –

… … Gandhiji Assassin: Nathuram Godse’s Final Address to the Court.

Nathuram Godse was arrested immediately after he assassinated Gandhiji, based on a F. I.. R. filed by Nandlal Mehta at the Tughlak Road Police station at Delhi . The trial, which was held in camera, began on 27th May 1948 and concluded on 10th February 1949. He was sentenced to death. An appeal to the Punjab High Court, then in session at Simla, did not find favorable and the sentence was upheld. The statement that you are about to read is the last made by Godse before the Court on the 5th of May 1949.

Such was the power and eloquence of this statement that one of the judges, G. D. Khosla, later wrote, “I have, however, no doubt that had the audience of that day been constituted into a jury and entrusted with the task of deciding Godse’s appeal, they would have brought a verdict of ‘not Guilty’ by an overwhelming majority”

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WHY I KILLED GANDHI?

Born in a devotional Brahmin family, I instinctively came to revere Hindu religion, Hindu history, and Hindu culture. I had, therefore, been intensely proud of Hinduism as a whole. As I grew up I developed a tendency to free thinking unfettered by any superstitious allegiance to any isms, political or religious. That is why I worked actively for the eradication of untouchables and the caste system based on birth alone. I openly joined RSS wing of anti-caste movements and maintained that all Hindus were of equal status as to rights, social, and religious and should be considered high or low on merit alone and not through the accident of birth in a particular caste or profession.

I used publicly to take part in organized anti-caste dinners in which thousands of Hindus, Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, Chamars and Bhangis participated. We broke the caste rules and dined in the company of each other. I have read the speeches and writings of Ravana, Chanakiya, Dadabhai Naoroji, Vivekanand, Gokhale, Tilak, along with the books of ancient and modern history of India and some prominent countries like England , France , America , and Russia .Moreover I studied the tenets of Socialism and Marxism. But above all I studied very closely whatever Veer Savarkar and Gandhiji had written and spoken, as to my mind these two ideologies have contributed more to the molding of the thought and action of the Indian people during the last thirty years or so, than any other single factor has done.

All this reading and thinking led me to believe it was my first duty to serve Hinduism and Hindus both as a patriot and as a world citizen. To secure the freedom and to safeguard the just interests of some thirty crores (300 million) of Hindus would automatically constitute the freedom and the well-being of all India , one fifth of human race. This conviction led me naturally to devote myself to the Hindu Sanghtanist ideology and program, which alone, I came to believe, could win and preserve the national independence of Hindustan , my Motherland, and enable her to render true service to humanity as well.

Since the year 1920, that is, after the demise of Lokamanya Tilak, Gandhiji’s influence in the Congress first increased and then became supreme. His activities for public awakening were phenomenal in their intensity and were reinforced by the slogan of truth and non- violence which he paraded ostentatiously before the country. No sensible or enlightened person could object to those slogans. In fact there is nothing new or original in them. They are implicit in every constitutional public movement. But it is nothing but a mere dream if you imagine that the bulk of mankind is, or can ever become, capable of scrupulous adherence to these lofty principles in its normal life from day to day.

In fact, honour, duty, and love of one’s own kith and kin and country might often compel us to disregard non-violence and to use force. I could never conceive that an armed resistance to an aggression is unjust. I would consider it a religious and moral duty to resist and, if possible, to overpower such an enemy by use of force. [In the Ramayana] Rama killed Ravana in a tumultuous fight and relieved Sita.. [In the Mahabharata], Krishna killed Kansa to end his wickedness; and Arjuna had to fight and slay quite a number of his friends and relations including the revered Bhishma because the latter was on the side of the aggressor. It is my firm belief that in dubbing Rama, Krishna , and Arjuna as guilty of violence, the Mahatma betrayed a total ignorance of the springs of human action.

In more recent history, it was the heroic fight put up by Chhatrapati Shivaji that first checked and eventually destroyed the Muslim tyranny in India . It was absolutely essentially for Shivaji to overpower and kill an aggressive Afzal Khan, failing which he would have lost his own life. In condemning history’s towering warriors like Shivaji, Rana Pratap and Guru Gobind Singh as misguided patriots, Gandhiji has merely exposed his self-conceit. He was, paradoxical as it may appear a violent pacifist who brought untold calamities on the country in the name of truth and non-violence, while Rana Pratap, Shivaji, and the Guru will remain enshrined in the hearts of their countrymen for ever for the freedom they brought to them.

The accumulating provocation of thirty-two years, culminating in his last pro-Muslim fast, at last goaded me to the conclusion that the existence of Gandhi should be brought to an end immediately. Gandhi had done very well in South Africa to uphold the rights and well-being of the Indian community there. But when he finally returned to India he developed a subjective mentality under which he alone was to be the final judge of what was right or wrong. If the country wanted his leadership, it had to accept his infallibility; if it did not, he would stand aloof from the Congress and carry on his own way.

Against such an attitude there can be no halfway house. Either Congress had to surrender its will to his and had to be content with playing second fiddle to all his eccentricity, whimsicality, metaphysics and primitive vision, or it had to carry on without him.

He alone was the Judge of everyone and everything; he was the master brain guiding the civil disobedience movement; no other could know the technique of that movement. He alone knew when to begin and when to withdraw it. The movement might succeed or fail, it might bring untold disaster, and political reverses but that could make no difference to the Mahatma’s infallibility. ‘A Satyagrahi can never fail’ was his formula for declaring his own infallibility and nobody except himself knew what a Satyagrahi is. Thus, the Mahatma became the judge and jury in his own cause. These childish insanities and obstinacies, coupled with a most severe austerity of life, ceaseless work and lofty character made Gandhi formidable and irresistible.

Many people thought that his politics were irrational but they had either to withdraw from the Congress or place their intelligence at his feet to do with as he liked. In a position of such absolute irresponsibility Gandhi was guilty of blunder after blunder, failure after failure, disaster after disaster. Gandhi’s pro-Muslim policy is blatantly in his perverse attitude on the question of the national language of India . It is quite obvious that Hindi has the most prior claim to be accepted as the premier language. In the beginning of his career in India , Gandhi gave a great impetus to Hindi but as he found that the Muslims did not like it, he became a champion of what is called Hindustani.. Everybody in India knows that there is no language called Hindustani; it has no grammar; it has no vocabulary. It is a mere dialect, it is spoken, but not written. It is a bastard tongue and cross-breed between Hindi and Urdu, and not even the Mahatma’s sophistry could make it popular. But in his desire to please the Muslims he insisted that Hindustani alone should be the national language of India . His blind followers, of course, supported him and the so-called hybrid language began to be used. The charm and purity of the Hindi language was to be prostituted to please the Muslims. All his experiments were at the expense of the Hindus.

From August 1946 onwards the private armies of the Muslim League began a massacre of the Hindus. The then Viceroy, Lord Wavell, though distressed at what was happening, would not use his powers under the Government of India Act of 1935 to prevent the rape, murder and arson. The Hindu blood began to flow from Bengal to Karachi with some retaliation by the Hindus. The Interim Government formed in September was sabotaged by its Muslim League member’s right from its inception, but the more they became disloyal and treasonable to the government of which they were a part, the greater was Gandhi’s infatuation for them. Lord Wavell had to resign as he could not bring about a settlement and he was succeeded by Lord Mountbatten. King Log was followed by King Stork. The Congress which had boasted of its nationalism and socialism secretly accepted Pakistan literally at the point of the bayonet and abjectly surrendered to Jinnah. India was vivisected and one-third of the Indian territory became foreign land to us from August 15, 1947.

Lord Mount batten came to be described in Congress circles as the greatest Viceroy and Governor-General this country ever had. The official date for handing over power was fixed for June 30, 1948, but Mount batten with his ruthless surgery gave us a gift of vivisected India ten months in advance. This is what Gandhi had achieved after thirty years of undisputed dictatorship and this is what Congress party calls ‘freedom’ and ‘peaceful transfer of power’. The Hindu- Muslim unity bubble was finally burst and a theocratic state was established with the consent of Nehru and his crowd and they have called ‘freedom won by them with sacrifice’ – whose sacrifice? When top leaders of Congress, with the consent of Gandhi, divided and tore the country – which we consider a deity of worship – my mind was filled with direful anger.

One of the conditions imposed by Gandhi for his breaking of the fast unto death related to the mosques in Delhi occupied by the Hindu refugees. But when Hindus in Pakistan were subjected to violent attacks he did not so much as utter a single word to protest and censure the Pakistan Government or the Muslims concerned. Gandhi was shrewd enough to know that while undertaking a fast unto death, had he imposed for its break some condition on the Muslims in Pakistan , there would have been found hardly any Muslims who could have shown some grief if the fast had ended in his death. It was for this reason that he purposely avoided imposing any condition on the Muslims. He was fully aware of from the experience that Jinnah was not at all perturbed or influenced by his fast and the Muslim League hardly attached any value to the inner voice of Gandhi. Gandhi is being referred to as the Father of the Nation.

But if that is so, he had failed his paternal duty in as much as he has acted very treacherously to the nation by his consenting to the partitioning of it. I stoutly maintain that Gandhi has failed in his duty.

He has proved to be the Father of Pakistan. His inner-voice, his spiritual power and his doctrine of non-violence of which so much is made of, all crumbled before Jinnah’s iron will, and proved to be powerless. Briefly speaking, I thought to myself and foresaw I shall be totally ruined, and the only thing I could expect from the people would be nothing but hatred and that I shall have lost my entire honor, even more valuable than my life, if I were to kill Gandhiji. But at the same time I felt that the Indian politics in the absence of Gandhiji would surely be proved practical, able to retaliate, and would be powerful with armed forces. No doubt, my own future would be totally ruined, but the nation would be saved from the inroads of Pakistan. People may even call me and dub me as devoid of any sense or foolish, but the nation would be free to follow the course founded on the reason which I consider to be necessary for sound nation-building.

After having fully considered the question, I took the final decision in the matter, but I did not speak about it to anyone whatsoever. I took courage in both my hands and I did fire the shots at Gandhiji on 30th January 1948, on the prayer-grounds of Birla House. I do say that my shots were fired at the person whose policy and action had brought rack and ruin and destruction to millions of Hindus. There was no legal machinery by which such an offender could be brought to book and for this reason I fired those fatal shots. I bear no ill will towards anyone individually but I do say that I had no respect for the present government owing to their policy which was unfairly favorable towards the Muslims. But at the same time I could clearly see that the policy was entirely due to the presence of Gandhi.

I have to say with great regret that Primes Minister Nehru quite forgets that his preaching’s and deeds are at times at variances with each other when he talks about India as a secular state in season and out of season, because it is significant to note that Nehru has played a leading role in the establishment of the theocratic state of Pakistan, and his job was made easier by Gandhi’s persistent policy of appeasement towards the Muslims. I now stand before the court to accept the full share of my responsibility for what I have done and the judge would, of course, pass against me such orders of sentence as may be considered proper. But I would like to add that I do not desire any mercy to be shown to me, nor do I wish that anyone else should beg for mercy on my behalf. My confidence about the moral side of my action has not been shaken even by the criticism leveled against it on all sides. I have no doubt that honest writers of history will weighs my act and find the true value thereof some day in future.

JAI HIND !

Klaus Klostermaier on how Indian history was re-written in colonial period, and entirely built on colonial prejudices and made to fit with Biblical chronology. He also examines how a new generation is challenging these versions of history with scientific facts, not rhetoric.

http://content.iskcon.org/icj/6_1/6_1klostermaier.html

Questioning the Aryan Invasion Theory and Revising Ancient Indian History1

Klaus Klostermaier NB. The footnotes for this article are linked to a separate footnote page. Introduction Tacitus, the classical Roman writer, claimed to have described past events and personalities in his works sine ira et studio, free from hostility and bias. This motto has guided serious historians through the ages, and it became their highest ambition to write history ‘objectively’, distancing themselves from opinions held by interested parties. The ideal was not always followed, as we know. We have seen twentieth century governments commissioning re-writings of the histories of their countries from the standpoint of their own ideologies. Like the court-chroniclers of former times, some contemporary academic historians wrote unashamedly biased accounts of events and redesigned the past accordingly. When, in the wake of World War II the nations of Asia and Africa gained independence, their intellectuals became aware of the fact that their histories had been written by representatives of the colonial powers which they had opposed. More often than not they discovered that all traditional accounts of their own past had been brushed aside by the ‘official’ historians as so much myth and fairytale. Often lacking their own academically trained historians-or worse, only possessing native historians who had taken over the views of the colonial masters-the discontent with existing histories of their countries expressed itself often in vernacular works that lacked the academic credentials necessary to make an impact on professional historians. The situation is slowly changing. A new generation of scholars who grew up in post-colonial times and who do not share the former biases, scholars in command of the tools of the trade-intimacy with the languages involved, familiarity with the culture of their countries, respect for the indigenous traditions-are rewriting the histories of their countries. Nowhere is this more evident than in India. India had a tradition of learning and scholarship much older and vaster than the European countries that, from the sixteenth century onwards, became its political masters. Indian scholars are rewriting the history of India today. The Aryan Invasion Theory and the Old Chronology One of the major points of revision concerns the so called ‘Aryan invasion theory’, often referred to as ‘colonial-missionary’, implying that it was the brainchild of conquerors of foreign colonies who could not but imagine that all higher culture had to come from outside ‘backward’ India, and who likewise assumed that a religion could only spread through a politically supported missionary effort. While not buying into the more sinister version of this revision, which accuses the inventors of the Aryan invasion theory of malice and cynicism, there is no doubt that early European attempts to explain the presence of Indians in India had much to with the commonly held Biblical belief that humankind originated from one pair of humans- Adam and Eve to be precise (their common birth date was believed to be c.4005 BCE)-and that all peoples on earth descended from one of the sons of Noah, the only human to survive the Great Flood (dated at 2500 BCE). The only problem seemed to be to connect peoples not mentioned in Chapter 10 of Genesis [‘The Peopling of the Earth’] with one of the Biblical genealogical lists. One such example of a Christian historian attempting to explain the presence of Indians in India is the famous Abbé Dubois (1770-1848), whose long sojourn in India (1792-1823) enabled him to collect a large amount of interesting materials concerning the customs and traditions of the Hindus. His (French) manuscript was bought by the British East India Company and appeared in an English translation under the title Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies in 1897 with a Prefatory Note by the Right Hon. F. Max Müller.2 Abbé Dubois, loath ‘to oppose [his] conjectures to [the Indians’] absurd fables’ categorically stated: It is practically admitted that India was inhabited very soon after the Deluge, which made a desert of the whole world. The fact that it was so close to the plains of Sennaar, where Noah’s descendants remained stationary so long, as well as its good climate and the fertility of the country, soon led to its settlement. Rejecting other scholars’ opinions which linked the Indians to Egyptian or Arabic origins, he ventured to suggest them ‘to be descendents not of Shem, as many argue, but of Japhet’. He explains: ‘According to my theory they reached India from the north, and I should place the first abode of their ancestors in the neighbourhood of the Caucasus.’3 The reasons he provides to substantiate his theory are utterly unconvincing-but he goes on to build the rest of his migration theory (not yet an ‘Aryan’ migration theory) on this shaky foundation. Max Müller (1823-1903), who was largely responsible for the ‘Aryan invasion theory’ and the ‘old chronology’, was too close in spirit and time to this kind of thinking, not to have adopted it fairly unquestioningly. In his Prefatory Note he praises the work of Abbé Dubois as a ‘trustworthy authority. . .which will always retain its value.’ That a great deal of early British Indology was motivated by Christian missionary considerations, is no secret. The famous and important Boden Chair for Sanskrit at the University of Oxford was founded by Colonel Boden in 1811 with the explicit object ‘to promote the translation of the Scriptures into Sanskrit, so as to enable his countrymen to proceed in the conversion of the natives of India to the Christian Religion’.4 Max Müller, in a letter to his wife wrote in 1886: ‘The translation of the Veda will hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of India and on the growth of millions of souls in that country. It is the root of their religion, and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last 3 000 years.’5 When the affinity between many European languages and Sanskrit became a commonly accepted notion, scholars almost automatically concluded that the Sanskrit speaking ancestors of the present day Indians were to be found somewhere halfway between India and the Western borders of Europe-Northern Germany, Scandinavia, Southern Russia, the Pamir-from which they invaded the Punjab. (It is also worth noting that the early armchair scholars who conceived these grandiose migration theories, had no actual knowledge of the terrain their ‘Aryan invaders’ were supposed to have transversed, the passes they were supposed to have crossed, or the various climates they were believed to have been living in). Assuming that the Vedic Indians were semi-nomadic warriors and cattle-breeders, it fitted the picture, when Mohenjo Daro and Harappa were discovered, to also assume that these were the cities the Aryan invaders destroyed under the leadership of their god Indra, the ‘city-destroyer’, and that the dark-skinned indigenous people were the ones on whom they imposed their religion and their caste system. Western scholars decided to apply their own methodologies and, in the absence of reliable evidence, postulated a timeframe for Indian history on the basis of conjectures. Considering the traditional dates for the life of Gautama, the Buddha, as fairly well established in the sixth century BCE, supposedly pre-Buddhist Indian records were placed in a sequence that seemed plausible to philologists. Accepting on linguistic grounds the traditional claims that the Rigveda was the oldest Indian literary document, Max Müller allowing a time-span of two hundred years each for the formation of every class of Vedic literature, and assuming that the Vedic period had come to an end by the time of the Buddha, established the following sequence that was widely accepted: Rigveda c. 1200 BCE Yajurveda,Samaveda,Atharvaveda, c. 1000 BCE Brahmanas, c. 800 BCE Aranyakas,Upanishads, c. 600 BCE Max Müller himself conceded the purely conjectural nature of the Vedic chronology, and in the last work published shortly before his death, The Six Systems of Indian Philosophy, admitted: ‘Whatever may be the date of the Vedic hymns, whether 1500 or 15 000 BCE, they have their own unique place and stand by themselves in the literature of the world’ (p.35). There were, even in Max Müller’s time, Western and Indian scholars, such as Moriz Winternitz and Bal Gangadhar Tilak, who disagreed with his chronology and postulated a much higher age for the Rigveda. Indian scholars pointed out all along that there was no reference in the Veda of a migration from outside India, that all the geographical features mentioned in the Rigveda are those of north-western India and that there was no archaeological evidence whatsoever for the Aryan invasion theory. On the other side there were references to constellations in Vedic works whose timeframe could be calculated. The dates arrived at, however, 4500 BCE for one observation in the Rigveda, 3200 BCE for a date in the Shatapatha Brahmana, seemed far too remote to be acceptable, especially if one assumed-as many nineteenth century scholars did, that the world was only about 6 000 years old and that the flood had taken place only 4 500 years ago. Debunking the Aryan Invasion Theory: The New Chronology Contemporary Indian scholars, admittedly motivated not only by academic interests, vehemently reject what they call the ‘colonial-missionary Aryan invasion theory’. They accuse its originators of superimposing-for a reason-the purpose and process of the colonial conquest of India by the Western powers in modern times onto the beginnings of Indian civilisation: as the Europeans came to India as bearers of a supposedly superior civilisation and a higher religion, so the original Aryans were assumed to have invaded a country on which they imposed their culture and their religion. A recent major work offers ‘seventeen arguments: why the Aryan invasion never happened’.6 It may be worthwhile summarising and analysing them briefly: The Aryan invasion model is largely based on linguistic conjectures which are unjustified (and wrong). Languages develop much more slowly than assumed by nineteenth century scholars. According to Renfrew speakers of Indo-European languages may have lived in Anatolia as early as 7000 BCE The supposed large-scale migrations of Aryan people in the second millennium BCE first into Western Asia and then into northern India (by 1500 BCE) cannot be maintained in view of the fact that the Hittites were in Anatolia already by 2200 BCE and the Kassites and Mitanni had kings and dynasties by 1600 BCE There is no memory of an invasion or of large-scale migration in the records of Ancient India-neither in the Vedas, Buddhist or Jain writings, nor in Tamil literature. The fauna and flora, the geography and the climate described in the Rigveda are that of Northern India. There is a striking cultural continuity between the archaeological artefacts of the Indus-Saraswati civilisation and subsequent Indian society and culture: a continuity of religious ideas, arts, crafts, architecture, system of weights and measures. The archaeological finds of Mehrgarh (copper, cattle, barley) reveal a culture similar to that of the Vedic Indians. Contrary to former interpretations, the Rigveda shows not a nomadic but an urban culture (purusa as derived from pur vasa = town-dweller). The Aryan invasion theory was based on the assumption that a nomadic people in possession of horses and chariots defeated an urban civilisation that did not know horses, and that horses are depicted only from the middle of the second millennium onwards. Meanwhile archaeological evidence for horses has been found in Harappan and pre-Harappan sites; drawings of horses have been found in paleolithic caves in India; drawings of riders on horses dated c. 4300 BCE have been found in Ukraina. Horsedrawn war chariots are not typical for nomadic breeders but for urban civilisations. The racial diversity found in skeletons in the cities of the Indus civilisation is the same as in India today; there is no evidence of the coming of a new race. The Rigveda describes a river system in North India that is pre-1900 BCE in the case of the Saraswati river, and pre-2600 BCE in the case of the Drishadvati river. Vedic literature shows a population shift from the Saraswati (Rigveda) to the Ganges (Brahmanas and Puranas), also evidenced by archaeological finds. The astronomical references in the Rigveda are based on a Pleiades-Krittika (Taurean) calendar of c. 2500 BCE when Vedic astronomy and mathematics were well-developed sciences (again, not a feature of a nomadic people). The Indus cities were not destroyed by invaders but deserted by their inhabitants because of desertification of the area. Strabo (Geography XV.1.19) reports that Aristobulos had seen thousands of villages and towns deserted because the Indus had changed its course. The battles described in the Rigveda were not fought between invaders and natives but between people belonging to the same culture. Excavations in Dwaraka have lead to the discovery of a site larger than Mohenjodaro, dated c. 1500 BCE with architectural structures, use of iron, a script halfway between Harappan and Brahmi. Dwarka has been associated with Krishna and the end of the Vedic period. A continuity in the morphology of scripts: Harappan, Brahmi, Devanagari. Vedic ayas, formerly translated as ‘iron,’ probably meant copper or bronze. Iron was found in India before 1500 BCE in Kashmir and Dwaraka. The Puranic dynastic lists with over 120 kings in one Vedic dynasty alone, fit well into the ‘new chronology’. They date back to the third millennium BCE Greek accounts tell of Indian royal lists going back to the seventh millennium BCE. The Rigveda itself shows an advanced and sophisticated culture, the product of a long development, ‘a civilisation that could not have been delivered to India on horseback’ (p.160). Painted Gray Ware culture in the western Gangetic plains, dated ca 1100 BCE has been found connected to (earlier) Black and Red Ware etc. Let us consider some of these arguments in some detail. As often remarked, there is no hint in the Veda of a migration of the people that considered it its own sacred tradition. It would be strange indeed if the Vedic Indians had lost all recollection of such a momentous event in supposedly relatively recent times- much more recent, for instance, than the migration of Abraham and his people which is well attested and frequently referred to in the Bible. In addition, as has been established recently through satellite photography and geological investigations, the Saraswati, the mightiest river known to the Rigvedic Indians, along whose banks they established numerous major settlements, had dried out completely by 1900 BCE-four centuries before the Aryans were supposed to have invaded India. One can hardly argue for the establishment of Aryan villages along a dry river bed. When the first remnants of the ruins of the so-called Indus civilisation came to light in the early part of our century, the proponents of the Aryan invasion theory believed they had found the missing archaeological evidence: here were the ‘mighty forts’ and the ‘great cities’ which the war-like Indra of the Rigveda was said to have conquered and destroyed. Then it emerged that nobody had destroyed these cities and no evidence of wars of conquest came to light: floods and droughts had made it impossible to sustain large populations in the area and the people of Mohenjo Daro, Harappa and other places had migrated to more hospitable areas. Ongoing archaeological research has not only extended the area of the Indus-civilisation but has also shown a transition of its later phases to the Gangetic culture. Archeo-geographers have established that a drought lasting two to three hundred years devastated a wide belt of land from Anatolia through Mesopotamia to Northern India around 2300 BCE to 2000 BCE. Based on this type of evidence and extrapolating from the Vedic texts, a new story of the origins of Hinduism is emerging that reflects the self-consciousness of Hindus and which attempts to replace the ‘colonial-missionary Aryan invasion theory’ by a vision of ‘India as the Cradle of Civilisation.’ This new theory considers the Indus-civilisation as a late Vedic phenomenon and pushes the (inner-Indian) beginnings of the Vedic age back by several thousands of years. One of the reasons for considering the Indus civilisation ‘Vedic’ is the evidence of town-planning and architectural design that required a fairly advanced algebraic geometry-of the type preserved in the Vedic Shulvasutras. The widely respected historian of mathematics A. Seidenberg came to the conclusion, after studying the geometry used in building the Egyptian pyramids and the Mesopotamian citadels, that it reflected a derivative geometry-a geometry derived from the Vedic Shulva-sutras. If that is so, then the knowledge (‘Veda’) on which the construction of Harappa and Mohenjo Daro is based, cannot be later than that civilisation itself.7 While the Rigveda has always been held to be the oldest literary document of India and was considered to have preserved the oldest form of Sanskrit, Indians have not taken it to be the source for their early history. The Itihasa-Purana served that purpose. The language of these works is more recent than that of the Vedas and the time of their final redaction is much later than the fixation of the Vedic canon. However, they contain detailed information about ancient events and personalities that form part of Indian history. The Ancients, like Herodotus, the father of Greek histo-riography, did not separate story from history. Nor did they question their sources but tended to juxtapose various pieces of evidence without critically sifting it. Thus we cannot read Itihasa-Purana as the equivalent of a modern textbook of Indian history but rather as a storybook containing information with interpretation, facts and fiction. Indians, however, always took genealogies quite seriously and we can presume that the Puranic lists of dynasties, like the lists of paramparas in the Upanishads relate the names of real rulers in the correct sequence. On these assumptions we can tentatively reconstruct Indian history to a time around 4500 BCE. A key element in the revision of Ancient Indian History was the recent discovery of Mehrgarh, a settlement in the Hindukush area, that was continuously inhabited for several thousand years from c. 7000 BCE onwards. This discovery has extended Indian history for several thousands of years before the fairly well dateable Indus civilisation.8 New Chronologies Pulling together available archaeological evidence as it is available today, the American anthropologist James G. Schaffer developed the following chronology of early Indian civilisation: Early food-producing era (c. 6500-5000 BCE): no pottery. Regionalisation era (5000-2600 BCE): distinct regional styles of pottery and other artefacts. Integration era (2600-1900 BCE) : cultural homogeneity and emergence of urban centres like Mohenjo daro and Harappa. Localisation era (1900-1300 BCE ) blending of patterns from the integration era with regional ceramic styles. The Indian archaeologist S.P. Gupta proposed this cultural sequencing: Pre-ceramic Neolithic (8000-600 BCE) Ceramic Neolithic (6000-5000 BCE) Chalcolithic (5000-3000 BCE ) Early Bronze Age (3000-1900 BCE) Late Bronze Age ( 1900-1200 BCE) Early Iron Age (1200-800 BCE) Late Iron cultures According to these specialists, there is no break in the cultural development from 8000 BCE onwards, no indication of a major change, as an invasion from outside would certainly be. A more detailed ‘New Chronology’ of Ancient India, locating names of kings and tribes mentioned in the Vedas and Puranas, according to Rajarama9 looks somewhat like this: 4500 BCE: Mandhatri’s victory over the Drohyus, alluded to in the Puranas. 4000 BCE Rigveda (excepting books 1 and 10) 3700 BCE Battle of Ten Kings (referred to in the Rigveda) Beginning of Puranic dynastic lists: Agastya, the messenger of Vedic religion in the Dravida country. Vasistha, his younger brother, author of Vedic works. Rama and Ramayana. 3600 BCEYajur-, Sama-, Atharvaveda: Completion of Vedic Canon. 3100 BCE Age of Krishna and Vyasa. Mahabharata War. Early Mahabharata. 3000 BCEShatapathabrahmana, Shulvasutras, Yajnavalkyasutra, Panini, author of the Ashtadhyayi, Yaska, author of the Nirukta. 2900 BCE Rise of the civilisations of Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and the Indus-Sarasvati doab. 2200 BCE beginning of large-scale drought: decline of Harappa. 2000 BCE End of Vedic age. 1900 BCE Saraswati completely dried out: end of Harappa. Texts like the Rigveda, the Shatapathabrahmana and others contain references to eclipses as well as to sidereal markers of the beginning of seasons, which allow us by backward calculation, to determine the time of their composition. Experts assure us that to falsify these dates would have been impossible before the computer age. Old verses new? Or scientists verses philologists? We are left, at present, with two widely differing versions of Ancient Indian History, with two radically divergent sets of chronology and with a great deal of polemic from both sides. Those who defend the Aryan invasion theory and the chronology associated with it accuse the proponents of the ‘New Chronology’ of indulging in Hindu chauvinism. The latter suspect the former of entertaining ‘colonial-missionary’ prejudices and denying originality to the indigenous Indians. The new element that has entered the debate is scientific investigations. While the older theory rested on exclusively philological arguments, the new theory includes astronomical, geological, mathematical and archaeological evidence. On the whole, the latter seems to rest on better foundations. Not only were the philological arguments from the very beginning based more on strong assertions and bold guesses, civilisations both ancient and contemporary comprise more than literature alone. In addition, purely philologically trained scholars-namely grammarians-are not able to make sense of technical language and of scientific information contained even in the texts they study. Consider today’s scientific literature. It abounds with Greek and Latin technical terms, it contains an abundance of formulae composed of Greek and Hebrew letters. If scholars with a background in the classical languages were to read such works, they might be able to come up with some acceptable translations of technical terms into modern English but they would hardly be able to really make sense of most of what they read and they certainly would not extract the information which the authors of these works wished to convey to people trained in their specialities. The situation is not too different with regard to ancient Indian texts. The admission of some of the best scholars (like Geldner, who in his translation of the Rigveda, considered the best so far, declares many passages ‘darker than the darkest oracle’ or Gonda, who considered the Rigveda basically untranslatable) of being unable to make sense of a great many texts-and the refusal of most to go beyond a grammatical and etymological analysis of these-indicates a deeper problem. The Ancients were not only poets and litterateurs, but they also had their sciences and their technical skills, their secrets and their conventions that are not self-evident to someone not sharing their world. Some progress has been made in deciphering medical and astronomical literature of a later age, in reading architectural and arts-related materials. However, much of the technical meaning of the oldest Vedic literature still eludes us. The Rigveda–a code? The computer scientist and Indologist Subhash Kak believes he has rediscovered the ‘Vedic Code’ which allows him to extract from the structure, as well as the words and sentences of the Rigveda, and the considerable astronomical information which its authors supposedly embedded in it.10 The assumption of such encoded scientific knowledge would make it understandable why there was such insistence on the preservation of every letter of the text in precisely the sequence the original author had set down. One can take certain liberties with a story, or even a poem, changing words, transposing lines, adding explanatory matter, shortening it, if necessary, and still communicate the intentions and ideas of the author. However, one has to remember and reproduce a scientific formula in precisely the same way it has been set down by the scientist or it would not make sense at all. While the scientific community can arbitrarily adopt certain letter equivalents for physical units or processes, once it has agreed on their use, one must obey the conventions for the sake of meaningful communication. Even a non-specialist reader of ancient Indian literature will notice the effort to link macrocosm and microcosm, astronomical and physiological processes, to find correspondences between the various realms of beings and to order the universe by establishing broad classifications. Vedic sacrifices-the central act of Vedic culture- were to be offered on precisely built geometrically constructed altars and to be performed at astronomically exactly established times. It sounds plausible to expect a correlation between the numbers of bricks prescribed for a particular altar and the distances between stars observed whose movement determined the time of the offerings to be made. Subhash Kak has advanced a great deal of fascinating detail in that connection in his essays on the ‘Astronomy of the Vedic Altar’. He believes that while the Vedic Indians possessed extensive astronomical knowledge, which they encoded in the text of the Rigveda, the code was lost in later times and the Vedic tradition was interrupted.11 India, the cradle of (world-) civilisation? Based on the early dating of the Rigveda (c. 4000 BCE) and on the strength of the argument that Vedic astronomy and geometry predates that of the other known Ancient civilisations, some scholars, like N.S. Rajaram, George Feuerstein, Subhash Kak and David Frawley, have made the daring suggestion that India was the ‘cradle of civilisation’. They link the recently discovered early European civilisation (which predates Ancient Sumeria and Ancient Egypt by over a millennium) to waves of populations moving out or driven out from north-west India. Later migrations, caused either by climatic changes or by military events, would have brought the Hittites to Western Asia, the Iranians to Afghanistan and Iran and many others to other parts of Eurasia. Such a scenario would require a complete rewriting of Ancient World History-especially if we add the claims, apparently substantiated by some material evidence, that Vedic Indians had established trade links with Central America and Eastern Africa before 2500 BCE. It is no wonder that the ‘New Chronology’ arouses not only scholarly controversy but emotional excitement as well. Much more hard evidence will be required to fully establish it, and many claims may have to be withdrawn. But there is no doubt that the ‘old chronology’ has been discredited and that much surprise is in store for the students not only of Ancient India, but also of the Ancient World as a whole. Sorting out the questions: The ‘Revision of Ancient Indian History’ responds to several separate, but interlocking questions that are often confused. The (emotionally) most important question is that of the original home of Vedic civilisation, identified with the question: where was the (Rig-)Veda composed? India’s indigenous answer to that question had always been ‘India’, more precisely ‘the Punjab’. The European, ‘colonial missionary’ assumption, was ‘outside India’. The next question, not often explicitly asked, is: where did the pre-Vedic people, the ‘Aryans’ come from? This is a problem for archeo-anthropologists rather than for historians. The racial history of India shows influences from many quarters. A related, but separate question concerns the ‘cradle of civilisation’, to which several ancient cultures have laid claim: Sumeria, Egypt, India (possibly also China could be mentioned, which considered itself for a long time the only truly civilised country). Depending on what answer we receive, the major expansion of population/civilisation would be from west to east, or from east to west. The famous lux ex oriente has often been applied to the spread of culture in the ancient world. India was as far as the ‘Orient’ would go. It is rather strange that the defenders of the ‘Aryan invasion theory’, who have neither archaeological nor literary documents to prove their assumption, demand detailed proof for the non-invasion and refuse to admit the evidence available. Similarly, they feel entitled to declare ‘mythical’ whatever the sources (Rigveda, Puranas) say that does not agree with their preconceived notions of Vedic India. Some conclusions: If I were to judge the strength of the arguments for revising Ancient Indian History in the direction of ‘India as Cradle of Civilisation’ I would rate Seidenberg’s findings concerning the Shulvasutra geometry (applied in the Indus civilisation; Babylonian and Egyptian geometry derivative to it) highest. Next would be the archeo-astronomical determination of astronomical data in Vedic and post-Vedic texts. Third is the satellite photography based dating of the drying out of the Saraswati and the archeo-geographical finding of a centuries long drought in the belt reaching from Anatolia through Mesopotamia and Northern India. Geological research has uncovered major tectonic changes in the Punjab and the foothills of the Himalayas. At one point a section rose about sixty metres within the past 2 000 years. ‘Vasishta’s Head’, a bronze head found near Delhi, was dated through radio-carbon testing to around 3700 BCE- the time when, according to Hicks and Anderson, the Battle of the Ten Kings took place (Vasishta, mentioned in the Rigveda, was the advisor to King Sudas). A further factor speaking for the ‘Vedic’ character of the Indus civilisation is the occurrence of (Vedic) altars in many sites. Fairly important is also the absence of a memory of a migration from outside India in all of ancient Indian literature: the Veda, the Brahmanas, the Epics and the Puranas. Granting that the Vedic Samhitas were ritual manuals rather than historic records, further progress in revising Ancient Indian History could be expected from a study of Itihasa-Purana, rather than from an analysis of the Rigveda (by way of parallel, what kind of reconstruction of Ancient Israel’s History could be done on the basis of a study of the Psalms, leaving out Genesis and Kings? Or what reconstruction of European History could be based on a study of the earliest Rituale Romanum?) An afterword: Hinduism today is not just a development of Vedic religion and culture but a synthesis of many diverse elements. There is no doubt a Vedic basis. It is evident in the caste-structure of Hindu society, in the rituals which almost every Hindu still undergoes (especially initiation, marriage and last rites), in traditional notions of ritual purity and pollution, and in the respect which the Veda still commands. There is a large area of Hindu worship and religious practice for which the Veda provides little or no basis: temple-building, image worship, pilgrimages, vows and prayers to gods and goddesses not mentioned in the Veda, beliefs like transmigration, world-pictures containing numerous heavens and hells and much more which appear to have been taken over from non-Vedic indigenous cultures. There have been historic developments that led to the developments of numerous schools of thought, sects and communities differing from each other in scriptures, interpretations, customs, beliefs. Apart from its Vedic origins Hinduism was never one in either administration, doctrine or practice. It does not possess a commonly accepted authority, does not have a single centre and does not have a common history. Unlike the histories of other religions, which rely on one founder and one scripture, the history of Hinduism is a bundle of parallel histories of traditions that were loosely defined from the very beginning, that went through a number of fissions and fusions, and that do not feel any need to seek their identity in conforming to a specific historic realisation. While incredibly conservative in some of its expressions, Hinduism is very open to change and development under the influence of charismatic personalities. From early times great latitude was given to Hindus to interpret their traditional scriptures in a great many different ways. The ease with which Hindus have always identified persons that impressed them with manifestations of God has led to many parallel traditions within Hinduism, making it impossible to chronicle a development of Hinduism along one line. The presentation of a history of Hinduism will be a record of several mainstream Hindu traditions that developed along individual lines; only very rarely do these lines meet in conflict or merge to generate new branches of the still vigorously growing banyan tree to which Hinduism has been often compared.

 

Following is the article written by David Frawley in “The India Times” David Frawley, a well-known Vedic scholar, runs the American Institute of Vedic Studies in santa Fe, New Mexico. He is also a famed Ayurveda doctor. Those interested in this subject may refer to his book “Gods, Sages and Kings: Vedic Secrets of Ancient Civilization”.

The Myth of the Aryan Invasion of India

By David Frawley

One of the main ideas used to interpret and generally devalue the ancient history of India is the theory of the Aryan invasion. According to this account, India was invaded and conquered by nomadic light-skinned Indo-European tribes from Central Asia around 1500-100 BC, who overthrew an earlier and more advanced dark-skinned Dravidian civilization from which they took most of what later became Hindu culture. This so-called pre-Aryan civilization is said to be evidenced by the large urban ruins of what has been called the “Indus valley culture” (as most of its initial sites were on the Indus river). The war between the powers of light and darkness, a prevalent idea in ancient Aryan Vedic scriptures, was thus interpreted to refer to this war between light and dark skinned peoples. The Aryan invasion theory thus turned the “Vedas“, the original scriptures of ancient India and the Indo-Aryans, into little more than primitive poems of uncivilized plunderers.

This idea totally foreign to the history of India, whether north or south has become almost an unquestioned truth in the interpretation of ancient history Today, after nearly all the reasons for its supposed validity have been refuted, even major Western scholars are at last beginning to call it in question.

In this article we will summarize the main points that have arisen. This is a complex subject that I have dealt with in depth in my book “Gods, Sages and Kings: Vedic Secrets of Ancient Civilization“, for those interested in further examination of the subject.

The Indus valley culture was pronounced pre-Aryans for several reasons that were largely part of the cultural milieu of nineteenth century European thinking As scholars following Max Mullar had decided that the Aryans came into India around 1500 BC, since the Indus valley culture was earlier than this, they concluded that it had to be preAryan. Yet the rationale behind the late date for the Vedic culture given by Muller was totally speculative. Max Muller, like many of the Christian scholars of his era, believed in Biblical chronology. This placed the beginning of the world at 400 BC and the flood around 2500 BC. Assuming to those two dates, it became difficult to get the Aryans in India before 1500 BC.

Muller therefore assumed that the five layers of the four ‘Vedas‘ & ‘Upanishads‘ were each composed in 200 year periods before the Buddha at 500 BC. However, there are more changes of language in Vedic Sanskrit itself than there are in classical Sanskrit since Panini, also regarded as a figure of around 500 BC, or a period of 2500 years. Hence it is clear that each of these periods could have existed for any number of centuries and that the 200 year figure is totally arbitrary and is likely too short a figure.

It was assumed by these scholars many of whom were also Christian missionaries unsympathetic to the ‘Vedas‘ that the Vedic culture was that of primitive nomads from Central Asia. Hence they could not have founded any urban culture like that of the Indus valley. The only basis for this was a rather questionable interpretation of the ‘Rig Veda‘ that they made, ignoring the sophisticated nature of the culture presented within it.

Meanwhile, it was also pointed out that in the middle of the second millennium BC, a number of Indo-European invasions apparently occured in the Middle East, wherein Indo-European peoples the Hittites, Mit tani and Kassites conquered and ruled Mesopotamia for some centuries. An Aryan invasion of India would have been another version of this same movement of Indo-European peoples. On top of this, excavators of the Indus valley culture, like Wheeler, thought they found evidence of destruction of the culture by an outside invasion confirming this.

The Vedic culture was thus said to be that of primitive nomads who came out of Central Asia with their horse-drawn chariots and iron weapons and overthrew the cities of the more advanced Indus valley culture, with their superior battle tactics. It was pointed out that no horses, chariots or iron was discovered in Indus valley sites.

This was how the Aryan invasion theory formed and has remained since then. Though little has been discovered that confirms this theory, there has been much hesitancy to question it, much less to give it up.

Further excavations discovered horses not only in Indus Valley sites but also in pre-Indus sites. The use of the horse has thus been proven for the whole range of ancient Indian history. Evidence of the wheel, and an Indus seal showing a spoked wheel as used in chariots, has also been found, suggesting the usage of chariots.

Moreover, the whole idea of nomads with chariots has been challenged. Chariots are not the vehicles of nomads. Their usage occured only in ancient urban cultures with much flat land, of which the river plain of north India was the most suitable. Chariots are totally unsuitable for crossing mountains and deserts, as the so-called Aryan invasion required.

That the Vedic culture used iron & must hence date later than the introduction of iron around 1500 BC revolves around the meaning of the Vedic term “ayas“, interpreted as iron. ‘Ayas‘ in other Indo- European languages like Latin or German usually means copper, bronze or ore generally, not specially iron. There is no reason to insist that in such earlier Vedic times, ‘ayas’ meant iron, particularly since other metals are not mentioned in the ‘Rig Veda’ (except gold that is much more commonly referred to than ayas). Moreover, the ‘Atharva Veda‘ and ‘Yajur Veda‘ speak of different colors of ‘ayas'(such as red & black), showing that it was a generic term. Hence it is clear that ‘ayas’ generally meant metal and not specifically iron.

Moreover, the enemies of the Vedic people in the ‘Rig Veda’ also use ayas, even for making their cities, as do the Vedic people themselves. Hence there is nothing in Vedic literture to show that either the Vedic culture was an ironbased culture or that there enemies were not.

The ‘Rig Veda‘ describes its Gods as ‘destroyers of cities‘. This was used also to regard the Vedic as a primitive non-urban culture that destroys cities and urban civilization. However, there are also many verses in the ‘Rig Veda’ that speak of the Aryans as having having cities of their own and being protected by cities upto a hundred in number. Aryan Gods like Indra, Agni, Saraswati and the Adityas are praised as being like a city. Many ancient kings, including those of Egypt and Mesopotamia, had titles like destroyer or conquerer of cities. This does not turn them into nomads. Destruction of cities also happens in modern wars; this does not make those who do this nomads. Hence the idea of Vedic culture as destroying but not building the cities is based upon ignoring what the Vedas actually say about their own cities.

Further excavation revealed that the Indus Valley culture was not des- troyed by outside invasion, but according to internal causes and, most likely, floods. Most recently a new set of cities has been found in India (like the Dwaraka and Bet Dwaraka sites by S.R. Rao and the National Institute of Oceanography in India) which are intermidiate between those of the Indus culture and later ancient India as visited by the Greeks. This may eliminate the so-called dark age following the presumed Aryan invasion and shows a continuous urban occupation in India back to the beginning of the Indus culture.

The interpretation of the religion of the Indus Valley culture -made incidentlly by scholars such as Wheeler who were not religious scholars much less students of Hinduism was that its religion was different than the Vedic and more likely the later Shaivite religion. However, further excavations both in Indus Valley site in Gujarat, like Lothal, and those in Rajsthan, like Kalibangan show large number of fire altars like those used in the Vedic religion, along with bones of oxen, potsherds, shell jewelry and other items used in the rituals described in the ‘Vedic Brahmanas‘. Hence the Indus Valley culture evidences many Vedic practices that can not be merely coincidental. That some of its practices appeared non-Vedic to its excavators may also be attributed to their misunderstanding or lack of knowledge of Vedic and Hindu culture generally, wherein Vedism and Shaivism are the same basic tradition.

We must remember that ruins do not necessarily have one interpretation. Nor does the ability to discover ruins necessarily gives the ability to interpret them correctly.

The Vedic people were thought to have been a fair-skinned race like the Europeans owing to the Vedic idea of a war between light and darkness, and the Vedic people being presented as children of light or children of the sun. Yet this idea of a war between light and darkness exists in most ancient cultures, including the Persian and the Egyptian. Why don’t we interpret their scriptures as a war between light and dark-skinned people? It is purely a poetic metaphor, not a cultural statement. Moreover, no real traces of such a race are found in India.

Anthropologists have observed that the present population of Gujarat is composed of more or less the same ethnic groups as are noticed at Lothal in 2000 BC. Similarly, the present population of the Punjab is said to be ethnically the same as the population of Harappa and Rupar 4000 years ago. Linguistically the present day population of Gujrat and Punjab belongs to the Indo-Aryan language speaking group. The only inference that can be drawn from the anthropological and linguistic evidences adduced above is that the Harappan population in the Indus Valley and Gujrat in 2000 BC was composed of two or more groups, the more dominent among them having very close ethnic affinities with the present day Indo-Aryan speaking population of India.

In other words there is no racial evidence of any such Indo-Aryan invasion of India but only of a continuity of the same group of people who traditionally considered themselves to be Aryans.

There are many points in fact that prove the Vedic nature of the Indus Valley culture. Further excavation has shown that the great majority of the sites of the Indus Valley culture were east, not west of Indus. In fact, the largest concentration of sites appears in an area of Punjab and Rajsthan near the dry banks of ancient Saraswati and Drishadvati rivers. The Vedic culture was said to have been founded by the sage Manu between the banks of Saraswati and Drishadvati rivers. The Saraswati is lauded as the main river (naditama) in the ‘Rig Veda’ & is the most frequently mentioned in the text. It is said to be a great flood and to be wide, even endless in size. Saraswati is said to be “pure in course from the mountains to the sea“. Hence the Vedic people were well acquainted with this river and regarded it as their immemorial hoemland.

The Saraswati, as modern land studies now reveal, was indeed one of the largest, if not the largest river in India. In early ancient and pre-historic times, it once drained the Sutlej, Yamuna and the Ganges, whose courses were much different than they are today. However, the Saraswati river went dry at the end of the Indus Valley culture and before the so-called Aryan invasion or before 1500 BC. In fact this may have caused the ending of the Indus culture. How could the Vedic Aryans know of this river and establish their culture on its banks if it dried up before they arrived? Indeed the Saraswati as described in the ‘Rig Veda’ appears to more accurately show it as it was prior to the Indus Valley culture as in the Indus era it was already in decline.

Vedic and late Vedic texts also contain interesting astronomical lore. The Vedic calender was based upon astronomical sightings of the equinoxes and solstices. Such texts as ‘Vedanga Jyotish‘ speak of a time when the vernal equinox was in the middle of the Nakshtra Aslesha (or about 23 degrees 20 minutes Cancer). This gives a date of 1300 BC. The ‘Yajur Veda’ and ‘Atharva Veda’ speak of the vernal equinox in the Krittikas (Pleiades; early Taurus) and the summer solstice (ayana) in Magha (early Leo). This gives a date about 2400 BC. Yet earlier eras are mentioned but these two have numerous references to substantiate them. They prove that the Vedic culture existed at these periods and already had a sophisticated system of astronomy. Such references were merely ignored or pronounced unintelligible by Western scholars because they yielded too early a date for the ‘Vedas’ than what they presumed, not because such references did not exist.

Vedic texts like ‘Shatapatha Brahmana‘ and ‘Aitereya Brahmana‘ that mention these astronomical references list a group of 11 Vedic Kings, including a number of figures of the ‘Rig Veda’, said to have conquered the region of India from ‘sea to sea’. Lands of the Aryans are mentioned in them from Gandhara (Afganistan) in the west to Videha (Nepal) in the east, and south to Vidarbha (Maharashtra). Hence the Vedic people were in these regions by the Krittika equinox or before 2400 BC. These passages were also ignored by Western scholars and it was said by them that the ‘Vedas’ had no evidence of large empires in India in Vedic times. Hence a pattern of ignoring literary evidence or misinterpreting them to suit the Aryan invasion idea became prevalent, even to the point of changing the meaning of Vedic words to suit this theory.

According to this theory, the Vedic people were nomads in the Punjab, comming down from Central Asia. However, the ‘Rig Veda’ itself has nearly 100 references to ocean (samudra), as well as dozens of references to ships, and to rivers flowing in to the sea. Vedic ancestors like Manu, Turvasha, Yadu and Bhujyu are flood figures, saved from across the sea. The Vedic God of the sea, Varuna, is the father of many Vedic seers and seer families like Vasishta, Agastya and the Bhrigu seers. To preserve the Aryan invasion idea it was assumed that the Vedic (and later sanskrit) term for ocean, samudra, originally did not mean the ocean but any large body of water, especially the Indus river in Punjab. Here the clear meaning of a term in ‘Rig Veda’ and later times verified by rivers like Saraswati mentioned by name as flowing into the sea was altered to make the Aryan invasion theory fit. Yet if we look at the index to translation of the ‘Rig Veda’ by Griffith for example, who held to this idea that samudra didn’t really mean the ocean, we find over 70 references to ocean or sea. If samudra does noe mean ocean why was it traslated as such? It is therefore without basis to locate Vedic kings in Central Asia far from any ocean or from the massive Saraswati river, which form the background of their land and the symbolism of their hymns.

One of the latest archeological ideas is that the Vedic culture is evidenced by Painted Grey Ware pottery in north India, which apears to date around 1000 BC and comes from the same region between the Ganges and Yamuna as later Vedic culture is related to. It is thought to be an inferior grade of pottery and to be associated with the use of iron that the ‘Vedas’ are thought to mention. However it is associated with a pig and rice culture, not the cow and barley culture of the ‘Vedas’. Moreover it is now found to be an organic development of indegenous pottery, not an introduction of invaders.

Painted Grey Ware culture represents an indigenous cultural development and does not reflect any cultural intrusion from the West i.e. an Indo-Aryan invasion. Therefore, there is no archeological evidence corroborating the fact of an Indo-Aryan invasion.

In addition, the Aryans in the Middle East, most notably the Hittites, have now been found to have been in that region atleast as early as 2200 BC, wherein they are already mentioned. Hence the idea of an Aryan invasion into the Middle East has been pushed back some centuries, though the evidence so far is that the people of the mountain regions of the Middle East were Indo-Europeans as far as recorded history can prove.

The Aryan Kassites of the ancient Middle East worshipped Vedic Gods like Surya and the Maruts, as well as one named Himalaya. The Aryan Hittites and Mittani signed a treaty with the name of the Vedic Gods Indra, Mitra, Varuna and Nasatyas around 1400 BC. The Hittites have a treatise on chariot racing written in almost pure Sanskrit. The IndoEuropeans of the ancient Middle East thus spoke Indo-Aryan, not Indo-Iranian languages and thereby show a Vedic culture in that region of the world as well.

The Indus Valley culture had a form of writing, as evidenced by numerous seals found in the ruins. It was also assumed to be non-Vedic and probably Dravidian, though this was never proved. Now it has been shown that the majority of the late Indus signs are identical with those of later Hindu Brahmi and that there is an organic development between the two scripts. Prevalent models now suggest an Indo-European base for that language.

It was also assumed that the Indus Valley culture derived its civilization from the Middle East, probably Sumeria, as antecedents for it were not found in India. Recent French excavations at Mehrgarh have shown that all the antecedents of the Indus Valley culture can be found within the subcontinent and going back before 6000 BC.

In short, some Western scholars are beginning to reject the Aryan invasion or any outside origin for Hindu civilization.

Current archeological data do not support the existence of an Indo Aryan or European invasion into South Asia at any time in the preor protohistoric periods. Instead, it is possible to document archeologically a series of cultural changes reflecting indigenous cultural development from prehistoric to historic periods. The early Vedic literature describes not a human invasion into the area, but a fundamental restructuring of indigenous society. The Indo-Aryan invasion as an academic concept in 18th and 19th century Europe reflected the cultural milieu of the period. Linguistic data were used to validate the concept that in turn was used to interpret archeological and anthropological data.

In other words, Vedic literature was interpreted on the assumption that there was an Aryan invasion. Then archeological evidence was interpreted by the same assumption. And both interpretations were then used to justify each other. It is nothing but a tautology, an exercise in circular thinking that only proves that if assuming something is true, it is found to be true!

Another modern Western scholar, Colin Renfrew, places the IndoEuropeans in Greece as early as 6000 BC. He also suggests such a possible early date for their entry into India.

As far as I can see there is nothing in the Hymns of the ‘Rig Veda’ which demonstrates that the Vedic-speaking population was intrusive to the area: this comes rather from a historical assumption of the ‘comming of the Indo-Europeans.

When Wheeler speaks of ‘the Aryan invasion of the land of the 7 rivers, the Punjab’, he has no warrenty at all, so far as I can see. If one checks the dozen references in the ‘Rig Veda’ to the 7 rivers, there is nothing in them that to me implies invasion: the land of the 7 rivers is the land of the ‘Rig Veda’, the scene of action. Nor is it implied that the inhabitants of the walled cities (including the Dasyus) were any more aboriginal than the Aryans themselves.

Despite Wheeler’s comments, it is difficult to see what is particularly non-Aryan about the Indus Valley civilization. Hence Renfrew suggests that the Indus Valley civilization was in fact Indo-Aryan even prior to the Indus Valley era:

This hypothesis that early Indo-European languages were spoken in North India with Pakistan and on the Iranian plateau at the 6th millennium BC has the merit of harmonizing symmetrically with the theory for the origin of the IndoEuropean languages in Europe. It also emphasizes the continuity in the Indus Valley and adjacent areas from the early neolithic through to the floruit of the Indus Valley civilization.

This is not to say that such scholars appreciate or understand the ‘Vedas’ their work leaves much to be desired in this respect but that it is clear that the whole edifice built around the Aryan invasion is beginning to tumble on all sides. In addition, it does not mean that the ‘Rig Veda’ dates from the Indus Valley era. The Indus Valley culture resembles that of the ‘Yajur Veda’ and the reflect the pre-Indus period in India, when the Saraswati river was more prominent.

The acceptance of such views would create a revolution in our view of history as shattering as that in science caused by Einstein’s theory of relativity. It would make ancient India perhaps the oldest, largest and most central of ancient cultures. It would mean that the Vedic literary record already the largest and oldest of the ancient world even at a 1500 BC date would be the record of teachings some centuries or thousands of years before that. It would mean that the ‘Vedas’ are our most authentic record of the ancient world. It would also tend to validate the Vedic view that the Indo-Europeans and other Aryan peoples were migrants from India, not that the Indo-Aryans were invaders into India. Moreover, it would affirm the Hindu tradition that the Dravidians were early offshoots of the Vedic people through the seer Agastya, and not unaryan peoples.

In closing, it is important to examine the social and political implications of the Aryan invasion idea:

• First, it served to divide India into a northern Aryan and southern Dravidian culture which were made hostile to each other. This kept the Hindus divided and is still a source of social tension.
• Second, it gave the British an excuse in their conquest of India. They could claim to be doing only what the Aryan ancestors of the Hindus had previously done millennia ago.
• Third, it served to make Vedic culture later than and possibly derived from Middle Eastern cultures. With the proximity and relationship of the latter with the Bible and Christianity, this kept the Hindu religion as a sidelight to the development of religion and civilization to the West.
• Fourth, it allowed the sciences of India to be given a Greek basis, as any Vedic basis was largely disqualified by the primitive nature of the Vedic culture.

This discredited not only the ‘Vedas’ but the genealogies of the ‘Puranas’ and their long list of the kings before the Buddha or Krishna were left without any historical basis. The ‘Mahabharata‘, instead of a civil war in which all the main kings of India participated as it is described, became a local skirmish among petty princes that was later exaggerated by poets. In short, it discredited the most of the Hindu tradition and almost all its ancient literature. It turned its scriptures and sages into fantacies and exaggerations.

This served a social, political and economical purpose of domination, proving the superiority of Western culture and religion. It made the Hindus feel that their culture was not the great thing that their sages and ancestors had said it was. It made Hindus feel ashamed of their culture that its basis was neither historical nor scientific. It made them feel that the main line of civilization was developed first in the Middle East and then in Europe and that the culture of India was peripheral and secondary to the real development of world culture.

Such a view is not good scholarship or archeology but merely cultural imperialism. The Western Vedic scholars did in the intellectual spehere what the British army did in the political realm discredit, divide and conquer the Hindus. In short, the compelling reasons for the Aryan invasion theory were neither literary nor archeological but political and religious that is to say, not scholarship but prejudice. Such prejudice may not have been intentional but deep-seated political and religious views easily cloud and blur our thinking.

It is unfortunate that this this approach has not been questioned more, particularly by Hindus. Even though Indian Vedic scholars like Dayananda saraswati, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Arobindo rejected it, most Hindus today passively accept it. They allow Western, generally Christian, scholars to interpret their history for them and quite naturally Hinduism is kept in a reduced role. Many Hindus still accept, read or even honor the translations of the ‘Vedas’ done by such Christian missionary scholars as Max Muller, Griffith, MonierWilliams and H. H. Wilson. Would modern Christians accept an interpretation of the Bible or Biblical history done by Hindus aimed at converting them to Hinduism? Universities in India also use the Western history books and Western Vedic translations that propound such views that denigrate their own culture and country.

The modern Western academic world is sensitive to critisms of cultural and social biases. For scholars to take a stand against this biased interpretation of the ‘Vedas’ would indeed cause a reexamination of many of these historical ideas that can not stand objective scrutiny. But if Hindu scholars are silent or passively accept the misinterpretation of their own culture, it will undoubtly continue, but they will have no one to blame but themselves. It is not an issue to be taken lightly, because how a culture is defined historically creates the perspective from which it is viewed in the modern social and intellectual context. Tolerance is not in allowing a false view of one’s own culture and religion to be propagated without question. That is merely self-betrayal.

References

1. “Atherva Veda” IX.5.4.
2. “Rig Veda” II.20.8 & IV.27.1.
3. “Rig Veda” VII.3.7; VII.15.14; VI.48.8; I.166.8; I.189.2; VII.95.1.
4. S.R. Rao, “Lothal and the Indus Valley Civilization“, Asia Publishing House, Bombay, India, 1973, p. 37, 140 & 141.
5. Ibid, p. 158.
6. “Manu Samhita” II.17-18.
7. Note “Rig Veda” II.41.16; VI.61.8-13; I.3.12.
8. “Rig Veda” VII.95.2.
9. Studies from the post-graduate Research Institute of Deccan College, Pune, and the Central Arid Zone Research Institute (CAZRI), Jodhapur. Confirmed by use of MSS (multi-spectral scanner) and Landsat Satellite photography. Note MLBD Newsletter (Delhi, India: Motilal Banarasidass), Nov. 1989. Also Sriram Sathe, “Bharatiya Historiography“, Itihasa Sankalana Samiti, Hyderabad, India, 1989, pp. 11-13.
10. “Vedanga Jyotisha of Lagadha“, Indian National Science Academy, Delhi, India, 1985, pp 12-13.
11. “Aitareya Brahmana“, VIII.21-23; “Shatapat Brahmana“, XIII.5.4.
12. R. Griffith, “The Hymns of the Rig Veda“, Motilal Banarasidas, Delhi, 1976.
13. J. Shaffer, “The Indo-Aryan invasions: Cultural Myth and Archeological Reality“, from J. Lukas(Ed), ‘The people of South Asia’, New York, 1984, p. 85.
14. T. Burrow, “The Proto-Indoaryans“, Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, No. 2, 1973, pp. 123-140.
15. G. R. Hunter, “The Script of Harappa and Mohenjodaro and its connection with other scripts“, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., London, 1934. J.E. Mitchiner, “Studies in the Indus Valley Inscriptions“, Oxford & IBH, Delhi, India, 1978. Also the work of Subhash Kak as in “A Frequency Analysis of the Indus Script“, Cryptologia, July 1988, Vol XII, No 3; “Indus Writing“, The Mankind Quarterly, Vol 30, No 1 & 2, Fall/Winter 1989; and “On the Decipherment of the Indus Script A Preliminary Study of its connection with Brahmi“, Indian Journal of History of Science, 22(1):51-62 (1987). Kak may be close to deciphering the Indus Valley script into a Sanskrit like or Vedic language.
16. J.F. Jarrige and R.H. Meadow, “The Antecedents of Civilization in the Indus Valley“, Scientific American, August 1980.
17. C. Renfrew, “Archeology and Language“, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1987.

Source: http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/ancient/aryan/aryan_frawley.html

 

The Myth of the aryan invasion 

http://www.gosai. com/chaitanya/ saranagati/ html/vedic- upanisads/ aryan-invasion. html

Related stories:

Invading the Sacred @ http://worldmonitor .wordpress. com/2007/ 08/13/invading- the-sacred/

Interview of an Evangelist @ http://indiasecular .wordpress. com/2007/ 10/07/interview- of-anevangelist/

Plot to Denigrate India @ http://indiaview. wordpress. com/2007/ 07/29/dalit- twist-to- textbook- row/

MOTIVATED  INDOLOGY @ http://indiaview. wordpress. com/2007/ 12/26/communal- clash-13- arrested/

 

— On Mon, 8/25/08, S. Kalyanaraman <kalyan97@gmail. com> wrote:

From: S. Kalyanaraman <kalyan97@gmail. com>
Subject: [hc] Colonial loot and other criminal acts/human rights violations of the British regime in Hindusthan
To:
Date: Monday, August 25, 2008, 8:06 PM

A research paper by Dr. VV Bedekar

British Policies and Indian Culture

Our politicians historians, sociologists, universities and the sacred media seem to have been convinced that the biggest obstruction in our progress is our past and religion and unless we divorce with those, we cannot become logical, rational and scientific, which is the key to progress and success in the modern world!
We are continuously fed on misinformation and there is deliberate attempt to distort our social history by ideologically motivated media, politicians and sociologists turned reformists.
The canvas of history covers thousands of years.
Achievements of any civilisation are judged by culture, literature, arts and sciences they have created and ecological and environmental conditions effectively they have produced. Strangely enough, the thinkers of the world have now realized the disastrous ecological condition of the world in which we live today. Scientists are also of the opinion that this disastrous condition is due to the same science, which is thought to have brought progress to mankind. India, which, according to our sociologists, politicians and the media, had an ugly past, and an inhuman religion, certainly could not and has not contributed anything worthwhile to modern progress and could have doubtfully achieved anything in the past.
But then what was the reason – from Max Muller to Schrodinger, who felt like taking inspiration from the cultural achievements and scriptures of India of the past ? Who was Panini ? How the writings of Kalidas were created ? How Bharata could write his Natyasastra and the country could reach the pinnacle of performing art ? What about Indian achievements in mathematics and astronomy ? What about paintings of Ajanta and Ellora and intricately carved temple architecture throughought the length and breadth of the country ? What about Yoga and spiritual achievements of the Hindus and the fully developed. medical science – Ayurveda ? What about the writings of Kautilya and Vatsyayana ? What about the achievements in textile, chemistry and metallurgy ? If, according to our media and great Marxist historians, our people in the past had no business other than indulging in exploitation of all kinds, how these achievements were possible ? One cannot forget, society needs optimum social, economic and cultural stability for any kind of creativity to take form and shape.

When are we going to realize that our past history is being distorted and our past has fallen a prey to the false propaganda of socialist ideology ? Modem sciences like anthropology, sociology, history etc., have been used as tools to mutilate our history and culture. This has successfully made us hate our own past, culture and religion.

It will be worthwhile to investigate how this was and is achieved and also the role played by the British in their different capacities – as missionaries, administrators, politicians, traders, reformers, sympathizers etc., and the effect and the deep impact it has left on Indian mind and culture.

We begin our investigation with missionaries and British administrative machinery and their contribution in this process.

The missionaries an the British administrators, who studied our past, had some interest in distorting our history. Missionaries were bent upon exploiting the shortcomings that had crept in our religious practices due to lack of adequate guidance and also due to factors like foreign invasions, wars and alien tyrranical rule, coupled with conversions. The British administrators, in order to justify their presence in India wanted to show that Indians were not fit for self-rule. To achieve this end, they wanted to implant a totally alien western system of governance by uprooting the then existing age-old indigenous systems, which practically included the total life of the governed. Those included the systems of law, education, medicine, revenue and land-tenure etc. To appreciate these two factors viz., the role of missionaries and the British administrators in mutilating our history, and uprooting all our systems in order to align them with their own social, cultural, economic and spiritual thinking and the way of life, one has to read history afresh and between the lines.

British Policies and Education Missionaries

 

In 1813, the Charter of the East India Company was renewed. The British Parliament insisted, in spite of opposition from the Directors of the Company on inserting a clause in the Charter, giving missionaries full freedom to settle and work in India. J. N. Farquhar notes this event and has commented that `soon afterwards there was a great influx of missionaries into the country.’ (J. N. Farquhar, Modern Religious Movements in India, first published in England in 1914. First Indian edition pub. by Munshiram  Manoharlal, Delhi 1967)

The missionaries opened schools and hospitals, orphanages etc. Education was not used by missionaries out of any humanitarian motive but they used education as a vehicle to westernize the indigenous people in every aspect of human life.
The tragedy is the systems of education, law, revenue, land-tenure etc., introduced by the Britishers and reforms initiated by the missionaries in our religion, have truly helped them to shape an Indian exactly dreamt of by Macaulay, the father of English system of education in India. His dream was –

“We must do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern, a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, words and intellect.”

– B.D. Basu, History of Education in India under the Rule of the East India Company, pp. 91-92.

J.N. Farquhar, while writing about Christian missionaries in the last and early decades of the l8th and l9th centuries respectively says :

“Then it was not long before the wiser men both in Missions and in the Government began to see that, for the immeasurable task to be accomplished, it was most necessary that missions should take advantage of the advancing policy of the government and that government should use missions as civilizing ally. For the sake of progress of India, co-operation was indispensable. ”

-J.N. Farquhar, op.cit,p.7
It throws light on how both the agencies – the missionaries and administrators worked in close coordination to each. other’s advantage.
These events and dates have a cardinal importance in Indian history. Because it is from 1820 to 1840 A.D. that all arms of Government which needed to control Indian society firmly as per their designs, were instituted. Farquhar has classically described the result of the new educational policy in the following words :

“The new educational policy of the Government created during these years the modem educated class of India. These are men who think and speak in English habitually, who are proud of their citizenship in the British Empire, who are devoted to English literature, and whose intellectual life has been almost entirely formed by the thought of the West, large numbers of them enter government services, while the rest practise law, medicine or teaching, or take to journalism or business. We must also note that the powerful excitement which has sufficed to create the religious movements we have to deal with is almost entirely confined to those who have had an English education.” (J.N. Farquhar, op.cit p.21)

These observations of Farquhar were made while delivering a series of lectures in 1912, practically after a century of the event of manipulating and introducing English system of Education in India. He talked of English educated Indians around 1850.

A graphic image of English education initiated Indian of the early 20th century is given by Anand K. Coomarswamy in 1908. He writes :

“Speak to the ordinary graduate of an Indian University, or a student from Ceylon, of the ideals of the Mahabharata – he will hasten to display his knowledge of Shakespeare : talk to him of religious philosophy – you find that he is an athiest of the crude type common in Europe a generation ago, and that not only has he no religion, but is lacking in philosophy as the average Englishman : talk to him of Indian music he will produce a gramophone or a harmonium, and inflict upon you one or both; talk to him of Indian dress or jewellery – he will tell you that they are uncivilized and barbaric; talk to him of Indian art- it is news to him that such a thing exists; ask him to translate for you a letter written in his own mothertongue – he does not know it. He is indeed a stranger in his own land.” (Modern Review, Calcutta, Vol.4, Oct. 1908, p.338)

These remarkable results were not achieved by fair means but by dubious and fraudulent tactics. We will see next how some of the prominent missionaries in Calcutta, Benares and Serampore manipulated the syllabus of the new educational institutions started by them for this purpose. Hundreds of Indians poured out of these institutions.
William Carey (1767-1837) William Hodge Mill (1792r1853) and John Muir (1810-1882) are some of the pioneers in this field and have played remarkable role in constructing the psychology of the Indians (of course as per the vision of Macaulay) coming out of the Institutions of English education. All these three Oriental scholars were acclaimed Sanskrit scholars, who have done some original work in translating Christian scriptures and theology into Sanskrit and vice versa.
Richard Fox Young in his book has given some important information in this regard.

Richard Fox Young writes about William Carey :

“In order to understand what he [Carey] wanted to do with India’s sacred language, one must note that Carey had two reasons for being interested in its utilization for evangelism. First, he saw that Sanskrit acted as a stabilizing force upon the unsettled dialects amidst which he worked. Second, he has intransigently opposed Brahminical privileges, one of which was hegemony over Sanskrit.”

Richard Fox Young, Resistant Hinduism : Sanskrit sources on anti-christian alopologetics in early nineteenth-centuty India p.33 published by The De Nobili Research Library, Vienna (1981)

Carey, who was an English Baptist Missionary, founded the famous Serampore College in 1818. It was his ambition to turn Serampore into “Christian Benares’. The syllabus of the course in Serampore College was framed with the above object in view. Writes Young further :

“His intentions were also avowedly aggressive, a direct result of conflicts with Brahmins. According to his plans, Hindu literature could be placed in disadvantageous juxtaposition with the Gospel, a task which would be done effectively only by evangelists acquainted with the original sources of both religions.”

– Richard Fox Young, op.cit, p.35.
Young quotes Carey himself to make clear the intentions Carey’s exercises :

“To gain the ear of those who are thus deceived it is necessary for them to believe that the speaker has a superior knowledge of the subject. In these circumstances a knowledge of Sanskrit is valuable. As the person thus misled, perhaps a Brahman, deems this a most important part of knowledge, if the advocate of truth be deficient therein, he labors against the hill; presumption is altogether against him.”

– William Carey, On encouraging the cultivation of Sanskrit among the natives of India, 1822 F.I. Quarterly 2-131-37)
William H. Mill was appointed as Principal of Bishop’s College, Calcutta, which was founded in 1820 by the Society for the Propagation of Gospel (London). Mills and H.H. Wilson have composed evangelical tracts in Sanskrit. According to Mill’s view point, Hinduism consisted of `Sublime precepts of spiritual abstractions’ overlaid with `monstrous and demoralizing legends’. Raja Ram Mohan Roy and other Indian critics of traditional Hinduism shared these very views.
John Muir came to Calcutta somewhere in 1827-28, He was a firm believer in Christianity and its propagation and was an outstanding scholar in Sanskrit. He served the East lndia Company in various administrative departments in North-West Frontier Province. His knowledge gave him an opportunity to work in the Sanskrit Department of the famous Benares College (1844-45) Writes Young

“Muir’s manipulation of the philosophy curriculum aimed at depriving the dersanas of all vestiges of revelation. This he attempted to do by forcing pandits to abandon their way of teaching, which he thought was tantamount to indoctrination, and to adopt free debate instead.”

– Richard Fox Young, op.cit, p,53.
Similarly, Sanskrit scholars in Bombay and Madras presidencies and other parts of the country were venturing into education activity with a firm belief, overtly and covertly, for propagation of Christianity in India.
(B) Administrators
After seeing the vital role played by missionaries in the field of education, we can now turn our attention to the chief architects of this policy – British administrators.

We have already seen that these achievements of English education were the results of a calculated, well-conceived, deliberate, well-planned, well-engineered and a foresighted policy. The framers of this policy were sagacious statesmen, thorough patriots and shrewd visionaries. The strong commonsense which they possessed was of an extraordinary high caliber.

Macaulay, no doubt, surpasses all others. However, Macaulay’s brother-in-law, Sir Charles E. Trevelyan and Lord William Bentinck are also Equal architects of this policy. These officers had a strong English superiority complex and utter disregard and disrespect, nay, hatred towards Indians and Indian culture. They knew nothing about Indian culture or education, customs, arts, sciences and what they knew were either the drawbacks or misinformation gathered from unauthoritative sources and hearsay.

However, occasional sympathies and reformism shown by the British should never camouflage their real and secret intentions. Macaulay was the chief architect of educational policy and it was Lord William Bentinck who introduced English as the Court language in India. He was very clear in his intentions of introducting English as Court language as seen in the letter of Court of Directors dated 29th July 1830 to Bengal :

“…. From the meditated change in the language of public business, including judicial proceedings, you anticipate several collateral advantages, the principal of which is, that the judge, or other European officer, being thoroughly acquainted with the language in which the proceedings are held, will be, and appear to be, less dependent upon the natives by whom he is surrounded, and those natives will in consequence, enjoy fewer opportunities of bribery or other undue emolument.”

Thus the interests of millions of Indians were sacrificed for the convenience and profit of a few Englishmen. Lord Bentinck was never in favour of educating the people of India in the real sense but he preferred anglicizing them, as he apprehended danger in spreading knowledge in this country. Bentinck’s opinion is recorded in his Minutes dated 13th March, 1835. However, Charles Metcalf, Governor General of India, disagreeing with the views of Bentinck observed in his own Minute dated l6th May, 1835 :

“….. His Lordship (Bentinck], however, sees further danger in the spread of knowledge and the operations of the Press. I do not for my own part, anticipate danger as certain consequences from these causes.”
– B.D.Basu, op.cit, p.67.

The third architect, Sir Charles E. Trevelyan, brother-in-law of Macaulay, is so clear and explicit in his ideas that even his enemies will have to appreciate his candidness so explicit in his ideas, foresight, vision and judgment. In his Evidence given before the Select Committee of the House of Lords on the Government of Indian Territories on 23rd June, 1853, he says:

“….. the effect of training in European learning is to give an entirely new turn to the native mind. The young men educated in this way cease to strive after independence according to the original Native model, and aim at, improving the instabilians of the country according to the English model, with the ultimate result of establishing constitutional self-govertunent. They cease to regard us as enemies and usurpers, and they look upon us as friends and patrons, and powerful beneficent persons, under whose protection all they have most at heart for the regeneration of their country will gradually be worked out. …..”

The following extracts from a paper submitted to the Parliamentary Committee of 1853 on Indian territories titled “The Political Tendency of the Different Systems of Education in use in India” by Sir Charles E. Trevelyan, brother-in-law of Macaulay, speak volumes about the intentions in introducing the English system of education in India. This document is so important that every student of history of English system of education in India must know it. He says :

“….. The spirit of English literature, on the other hand, cannot but be favorable to the English connection. Familiarly acquainted with us by means of our literature, the Indian youth almost cease to regard us as foreigners. They speak of great men with the same enthusiasm as we do. Educated in the same way, interested in the same objects engaged in the same pursuits with ourselves, they become more English than Hindoos, just as the Roman provincial became more Romans than Gauls or Italians… Every community has its ideas of securing the universal principal, in some shape or other, is in a state of constant activity; and if it be not enlisted on our side, it must be arrayed against us. As long as the natives are left to brood over their former independence, their sole specific for improving their condition is, the immediate and total expulsion of the English….. ‘ It is only by the infusion of European ideas, that a new direction can be given to the national views. The young men, brought up at our seminaries, turn with contempt from the barbarous despotism under which their ancestors groaned, to the prospect of improving their national institutions on the English model…… The existing connection between two such distant countries as England and India, cannot, in the nature of things, be permanent; no effort of policy can prevent the natives from ultimately regaining their independence. But there are two ways of arriving at this point. One of these is, through the medium of revolution; the other, through that of reform. In one, the forward movement is sudden and violent, in the other, it is gradual and peaceable. One must end in a complete alienation of mind and separation of interest between ourselves and the natives; the other in a permanent alliance, founded on mutual benefits and goodwill…. The only means at our disposal for preventing the one and securing the other class of result is, to set the natives on a process of European improvement, to which they ate already sufficiently inclined. They will then cease to desire and aim at independence on the old Indian footing. A sudden change will then be impossible and a long continuance of our present connection with India will even be assured to us…. The natives will not rise against us, because we shall stoop to raise them; there will be no reaction, because there will be no pressure; the national activity will be fully and harmlessly employed in acquiring and diffusing European knowledge, and naturalizing European institutions. The educated classes, knowing that the elevation of their country on these principles can only be worked out under protection, will naturally cling to us. They even now do so….. and it will then be necessary to modify the political institutions to suit the increased intelligence of the people, and their capacity for self-government. … In following this course we should be buying no new experiment. The Romans at once civilized the nations of Europe, and attached them to their rule by Romancing them; or, in other words, by educating them in the Roman literature and arts and teaching them to emulate their conquerors instead of opposing them. Acquisitions made by superiority in war, were consolidated by superiority in the arts of peace; and the remembrance of the original violence was lost in that of the benefits which resulted from it. The provincials of Italy, Spain, Africa and Gaul, having no ambition except to imitate the Romans, and to share their privileges with them, remained to the last faithful subjects of the Empire;….. . The Indian will, I hope soon stand in the same position towards us in which we once stood towards the Romans. Tacitus informs us, that it was the policy of Julius Agricola to instruct the sons of the leading men among the Britons in the literature and science of Rome and to give them a taste for the refinements of Roman civilization. We all know how well this plan answered. From being obstinate enemies, the Britons soon became attached and confiding friends; and they made more strenuous efforts to retain the Romans, than their ancestors had done to resist their invasion. It will be a shame to us if, with our greatly superior advantages, we also do not make our premature departure be dreaded as a calamity…. ..”

Macaulay had arrived in India in 1834, and he wrote his famous minute in 1835. No Indian can read Macaulay’s Minute without feeling deep humiliation, as Macaulay not only abused but insulted Indians. Macaulay knew nothing of Indian history and Indian literature. He was not acquainted with any branch of Indian thought. Knowing all this, Bentinck chose him to decide the very important controversy between the  accidentalists and the orientalists. It was the worst selection that ever could have been made.

The famous Minute which Macaulay wrote in 1835, remained unpublished till 1864. His nephew Sir George Otto Trevelyan first published them in Macmillan’s Magazine of May, 1864. Macaulay proudly records :

“We are at present a Board for Printing Books which are of less value than the paper on which they are printed was when it was blank, and for giving artificial encouragement’ s to absurd history, absurd metaphysics, absurd physics, and absurd theology.”

Macaulay’s motives behind his educational policy were not only political but religious as well as revealed in his letter of 1836 addressed to his father.

“…. The effect of this education on the Hindus is prodigious. No Hindu who has received an English education ever remains sincerely attached to his religion. Some continue to profess it as a matter of policy, but many profess themselves pure Deists and some embrace Christianity. It is my firm belief if our plans of education are followed up there will not be a single idolator among the respectable classes in Bengal thirty years hence.”

The comment on this letter by The Indian Daily News for March 30, 1909, is very significant. It says : “Lord Macaulay’s triumph over the Oriental School,…. was really the triumph of the deliberate intention to undermine the religious and social life of India…..It is no doubt a hard thing to say that this was not merely the consequence of his act but that it was also his deliberate intention, but the…. letter written in 1836, to his father shows how behind his splendid phrases, there lay quite a different , view.”

British Policies and Justice

 

 

But alas ! the newly educated Indians, who were coming out of engineered education system had started believing implicitly in the utter lies of equality, fraternity and justice, which the missionaries boast about their religion or the commitment of a British officer to sense of justice or giving protection to Indian subjects.

Many British officials did believe that India was a country of barbarous people, where `law of the jungle” prevailed, where people lacked education and the people were practically bereft of any culture or literature ! These British officers, who did not agree totally with this view, also wanted a change and the same system of administration and justice to which they were used to in their own country, John Dickinson describes the kind of legal system introduced by the British and the result it produced:

” We, the English, ignorantly assumed that the ancient, long-civilized people of India were a race of barbarians who had never known what justice was until we came among them, and that the best thing we could do for them was to upset all their institutions as fast as we could, and among others their judicial system, and give them instead a copy of our legal models at home (in England) ….. Even if the technical system of English law had worked well at home (as in many respects it did not), it would have been the grossest political empiricism to force it on a people so different from ourselves as every Oriental people are; and the reader may conceive the irreparable mischief it has done in India…., Long before we knew anything of India, native society there had been characterized by some peculiar and excellent institutions, prominent among them a municipal organization, providing a most efficient police for the administration of criminal law, while the civil law was worked by a simple process of arbitration, which either prevented litigation, or else insured prompt and substantial justice to the litigants… .. Instead of their own simple and rational mode of dispensing justice, we have given the Indian people an obscure, complicated, pedantic system of English law, full of artificial technicalities, which disable the candidates for justice from any longer pleading their own cause, and force them to have recourse to a swarm of attorneys and special pleaders, by means of which their expenses are greatly increased and the ends of justice are defeated.”- John Dickinvson, Government of India Under a Bureaucracy, London, 1853, pp. 41-47, Allahabad, 1925.

This statement of Dickinson and earlier quotations of various British authorities are adequate to give us an idea of what we had lost by losing our freedom in all respects. But even then there is no dearth of scholars in this country who are not losing a single opportunity of eulogizing the introduction of railway, postal system, medical facilities, British administration, taw etc., as great benefits of British rule in India.
During Hitler’s regime a tremendous scientific and technological progress was achieved with amazing speed in Germany. Stalin and Mao brought in discipline and some escalation in production in their countries. Even in South Africa during White regime, they have better material amenities than their brethren in other African countries. Can these achievements and successes be taken as justification for losing freedom at the hands of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and the White regime in South Africa ?

The myth of justice of the British gets further exploded by the letter of Mr. S.R. Wagel, an economist, which appears in the New York Times dated October 30, 1915:

” The Courts of justice in India are reasonably good so long as the dispute is between Indian and Indian. But . when it is a political case, or when it is a dispute between an Indian and an Englishman, there is no justice at all in nine cases out of ten.”
And the following statement of Henry Cotton appearing in his book `New India gives the most ugly racial intolerance the Britishers harboured against the Indians. He states:
” There are innumerable instances in which pedestrians have been abused and struck because they have not towered their umbrellas at the sight of an Englishman on the highway. It is a common outrage to assault respectable residents of the country because when passing on the road they have not dismounted from their horses in token of inferiority. There are a few Indian gentlemen, even of the highest rank, who have not had experiences of gross insult when travelling by railway, because Englishmen object to sit in the same carriage with a native. This form of insolence generally takes the shape of a forcible ejection of the Indian, together with all his goods and chattels. Here are two actual occurrences which ate typical : (1) A petty military officer entered a railway carriage where to his disgust he found a couple of Hindu gentlemen. He quietly waited until the train was in motion and then `fired them’, that is, tumbled them out of the door. (2) A Rajah going on an official visit of state to the city of Agra, took his seat, as was his right, in a first class compartment, with a first class send-off by his loyal and enthusiastic subjects. 1n the compartment were two Englishmen, muddy from snipe-shooting, who made him unloose their hunting boots and shampoo their legs.”-Sir Henry Cotton, New India, pp. 69-70.

British Policies, Villages Life and Economy

 

We have seen how the British education system was engineered to create `a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, words and intellect.’ We have also seen what kind of British justice was in India and how it affected the Indian society at large.

In the long history of India during the l6th, l7th and l8th centuries, Indian society lacked competent leadership in religion and military affairs in many parts of the country. India was struggling hard to survive against the onslaughts and ill-effects due to lack of social guidance and political instability. It was certainly a period of decay compared to her early history. In spite of this, it has retained its own social institutions, education systems, law and judiciary institutions, commerce and trade links and its own culture to suit its indigenous needs.

There is enough evidence to prove that with all the adversities, all sections of the society in Indian villages cared and worked for mutual interests and benefits. The village system wonderfully supported its own vocations; the approach was holistic. To-day’s political slogan viz., ” Thousands of years’ atrocities on the weaker sections” is not only a highly exaggerated claim but is a suicidal political game. It is the same British policies which thoroughly disturbed and upset the homogeneity and the unbroken continuity of village administration, trade and commerce. It will be worthwhile seeing how the policies of land, revenue, commerce, trade etc., were designed and introduced by the British in India. The same policies ultimately shattered the village economy and destroyed the vocations, doomed the artisans, reducing a fairly harmonious and peaceful society into a conflict-ridden, incompetent and docile society. The village artisans were forced to give up their traditional occupations and reduced to the status of laborers in many cases, which fact did not remain without affecting the village economy.

The observations of the various British officers in India which were ultimately put before the House of Parliament by the East India Company for the year 1812 formed one such consolidated  report. The details of village life given in this report have formed  the basis of various sociological theories on Indian village  system and its economy for the last two centuries. It is on the  strength of this Report that Karl Marx and Maine drew their  conclusions of an Indian village and formulated their theories of ‘ `oriental despotism and primitive Indo-Aryan commune’  respectively. Marx certainly knew little about India and her  history, and its value system. Marx was not a sympathizer of  imperialism or capitalism. But he could not conceal his western  bias and prejudices against Indian culture, which is evident from  his writings of 1853 and about his expectations of the role the British had to play in India. He writes :

“England has to fulfil a double mission in India; one destructive, the other regenerating – the annihilation of the old Asiatic society, and the laying of the material foundation of western society in Asia.”- First published in New York Daily Tribune, August 8, 1853.

This fact explains why Indian socialists of all hues and Marxists of all denominations are busily occupied in anti-culture activities – from history to literature. They are zealously fulfilling the dreams of their master ! Marx was obsessed thoroughly to westernize India by uprooting all its ancient systems of governance, of society and culture. According to Marx, Indian life had always been undignified, stagnatory, vegetative, passive, given to worshipping nature instead of putting the man on the pedestal as the sovereign of `Nature’. Karl Marx writes :

“Whatever may have been the crimes of England”, in India, “she was the unconscious tool of history” for the desired changes. – New York Daily Tribune dated June 25, 1853.

The views of Marx on India (in 1853) were actually the reproductions, continuations and extensions of the views expressed earlier by William Wilberforce in 1813, by James Mill in his three-volume History of British lndia (first published in 1817), and by Lord Bentinck and Macaulay in their Minutes around 1835. I have to remind the readers that this is the same period when English educated Indians were coming out of colleges started by the Missionaries and many of them became the leaders of early reformist movements in lndia. It is essential to understand who were their mentors and who shaped the outlook of such reformists. Marx’s assertion of Indian village as `oriental despotism and primitive Indo-Aryan commune’ was far from truth. In this background, it will be worthwhile taking into consideration some of the recorded opinions of British officers, who lived in India and observed keenly Indian culture in the villages and the changes wrought by British policies as well. I quote Sir Henry Cotton, who lived in India for more than 30 years and had keenly observed the Indian society.

“The people of India possess an instinctive capacity for local self-government. In the past (before the British came) the inhabitants of Indian villages under their own leaders formed a sort of petty republic, the affairs of which were managed by hereditary officers, any unfit person being set aside by popular judgement in favour of a more acceptable member of his family. It is by reason of the British administration only, that the popular authority of the village headman has been sapped, and the judicial power of the Panchayat, or Committee of Five, has been subverted. A costly and mechanical centralization has taken the place of the former system of local self-government and local arbitration. “- Sir Henry Cotton, op.cip.l70

I also quote Mr. W.M. Torrens,a Member of British Parliament. He writes:

“In most parts of India the village community, from timeout of mind, has been the unity of social, industrial and political existence. The village and its common interests and affairs have been ruled over by a council of Elders, always representative in character, who, when any dispute arose, declared what was the customary law….. In all Indian villages there was a regularly constituted municipality, by which its affairs, both of revenue and police, were administered, and which exercised magisterial and judicial authority… … Subordination to authority, the security of property, the maintenance of local order, the vindiction of character, the safety of life, all depended on the action of these nerves and sinews of the judiciary system. To maim or paralyse such a system, and working silently and effectively everywhere, as the British have done, may well be deemed a policy which nothing but the arrogance of conquest could have dictated. Yet these municipal institutions were rudely disregarded or uprooted by the new system of a foreign administration. Instead of the native Panchayat, there was established the foreign arbitrary judge; instead of men being tried, when accused, by an elective jury of their fellow citizens, they must go before a stranger, who could not, if he would, know half what every judge should know of the men and things to be dealt with. Instead of confidence, there was distrust ; instead I of calm, popular, unquestioned justice, there was substituted necessarily imperfect inquiry, hopelessly puzzled intelligence, the arbitration of foreign officials, guessing at the facts through interpreters, and stumbling over habits and usage which it must take a life-time to learn, but which every native juryman or elder could recall without hesitation. No wise or just historian can note these things without wonder and condemnation. ” – W.M. Torrens, Empire in Asia, pp. 100-03.

In 1853, Marx, who is known as a crusader against imperialism, had no qualms of any kind in giving imperialist Britain a free hand to rule ruthlessly in India against the wishes of the Indian people. But there were some sane people in England in 1853, who had exploded the myth of `rule of law’ by the British in India. One such person was John Dickinson, who has recorded :

“Since India has come under British rule her cup of grief has been filled to the brim, aye, it has been full and running over. The unfortunate Indian people have had their rights of property confiscated; their claims on justice and humanity trampled under foot; their manufacturers, towns and agriculturists beggared; their excellent municipal institutions broken up; their judicial security taken away ; their morality corrupted; and even their religious customs violated, by what are conventionally called the `blessings of British rule’….. Parliament eases its conscience regarding these tyrannies and wrongs in India by exhorting those that govern there to govern `paternally’ , just as Isaac Walton exhorts his angler, in hooking a worm, to handle him as if `he loved him’.- John Dickinson, op.cit pp. 41-47.
We have seen how every indigenous system was ruined by the British. We have seen the education system in the village replaced, and we have also seen the damage caused by the Britishers to the Indian villages and the myth of British justice. It is worth noting that land revenue and tenure systems were also tampered by the new land policies. The zamindari system introduced in Bengal was the gift of the Britishers to India. It is the British interference in land-ownership which made land a mortgagable commodity for the first time and which literally uprooted the villager from his home and means of subsistence.

I quote below a very interesting paragraph from a Ph.D. thesis :

“There seems little doubt however, that the British upset the traditional pattern of money-lending. Land had rarely been taken as security for a loan before they arrived, for one thing, only mirasdar occupant had any `transferable’ rights to land. The traditional method of dunning a recalcitrant debtor was to sit dharna at his door. Even as late as 1840 the land had little marketable value and few sales of land were made. But the Settlement of 1835 and the following years conferred unrestricted rights of transfer of land on occupants of all classes, and could now be taken in mortgage, and, what was more, could be recovered through the new British Courts of Law. The chief architect of `Survey Settlement’ – George Wingate saw this provision as a means of getting rid of uneconomic cultivators and of substituting for them, traders, pensioners and other parties having capital.”

-From Ph.D. Thesis, titled “The State and the Co-operative Movement in the Bombay Presidency: 1880-1930, submitted to the University of London (1960) by Ian James Catanach of the School of Oriental and African Studies. The author has quoted as sources -Note on Land Transfer and Agricultural Indebtedness in India’ (Government of India, 1895, p.19) and the `Joint Report of H.E. Goldsmid and G.Wingate, dated l7th Oct., 1840

Brirish Policies and Agriculture

 

The consequence of the introduction of the new policies in land, revenue, trade and village administration including justice, ` immensely contributed to disastrous famines in the second half of the l9th century. Agriculture was never merely an economic activity in India but a way of life. It will be difficult for a modern  Indian to believe that in all respects, in technology and yield, India was far superior to Europe in the l7th, l8th and up to the middle of the l9th century. Drill plough, rotation of crops, animal husbandry and breeding were virtually unknown in the l7th and l8th century Europe. 1n the l7th century, wheat production in U.K. was eight bushels per acre. Drill plough, rotation of crops and breeding of cattle were introduced to Britain in the l8th century. As a result of this, wheat yield in Britain rose to 20 bushels per acre in 1850. As early as 1877, a complete report on Indian wheat was called for by the Secretary
of State for India….. The result of Forbes Watson’s examination was found most satisfactory. India was capable of growing wheat of the highest quality. (Vide James MacKenna, Agriculture in India, Calcutta, 1915). The data from Allahabad – Northern India, indicated that the production of wheat was 96 bushels per acre per crop in 1903. Average Indian farmer used to take two crops per year. So the total yield per acre per year was 112 bushels. This picture changed gradually and reversed in India. Agriculture became uneconomic and less productive. The farmer became poorer and the village artisians were left without any economic activity, and thus the villagers started migrating to newly developing urban industrial centres for earning a living. The villages became symbols of backwardness and cities became symbols of progress.

British Policies: Textile, Trade, Geology and Mining

 

How the Britishers destroyed textile industry in India is a well-known fact. The cotton and silk fabrics manufactured in Bengal were levied heavy duties in U.K., while the British manufactured fabric was levied no duty in India. Inflow of British-made fabrics virtually ruined the Bengal cotton industry. It was highly discriminatory to the trade of Indian merchants and a petition of Indian traders was filed in the Privy Council in 1831 against this discrimination. There was no area, one could conceive, that escaped the imagination of the British rulers and which they did not use for the benefit of England at the cost of India. Even mining and geology were yoked to this purpose. I quote Andrew Grout :

“However by 1799 the Company was forced to change its policy in respect of copper as production from British mines began to decline and the home demand for copper increased, leading to the prohibition of copper exports in 1799. Although exports were later reinstated the price of copper remained high through the early 1800s, and as a result exports to India fell from 1,500 tons during the early 1790s to less than 400 tons by 1803. Thus we find Benjamin Heyne, surgeon and natural historian on the Madras establishment, reporting in 1801 `…..that times have altered, as the great demand of copper and probably. the decrease of this product in the mines of Cornwall have rendered discoveries of this metal (in India) as desirable as in periods of superfluity they would have been thought detrimental to the interests of Great Britain.”
Andrew Grout in his article `Geology and India: 1775-1805 : An Episode in Colonial Science’, South Asia Research, Vo1.10, No. 1, May, 1990, p. 5.
Even the most benign public health system was also not spared by the Britishers. Mark Harrison writes :

” The evangelical impulse, then, had not died with the Mutiny. Though shaken by the events of 1857-58, the mission to civilize’ Indian society underwent something of a renaissance in the last decade of the nineteenth century. The reformers found a new arena in which to engage the forces of `ignorance’ ; public health appeared to be one of the few remaining channels through which western values still might be introduced. It seemed possible that, even if it was not swayed by the humanitarian argument for reform, the colonial government might be persuaded that more vigorous public health policy was in its own interest.”

Mark Harrison in his article `Towards a Sanitary Utopia ? Professional Visions and Public Health in India, 1880-1914, in South Asia Research, Vol. 10, No. 1, May, 1990, p. 19.

Contemporary England

 

The educated Indian was getting convinced that his religion proved an insurmountable obstacle in his progress; he knew very little of what the condition in England was at that very time and a few centuries earlier. He unquestioningly believed in the false propaganda of the missionaries that Sanskrit was not taught to non-Brahmins by Brahmins in order to retain their monopoly and privileges by imparting Sanskrit education to Brahmins alone ! He never realized that imparting knowledge in India was not necessarily through schools but it was done by hereditary vocational/occupati onal system- from father to son in their respective vocation/occupation at home. What Max Muller could conceive about Indian education in 1882, is unfortunately not appreciated by many Indian historians, who are ready to jump to conclusions that Brahmins prevented lower castes’ from getting educated. But few care to read Max Muller’s observations :

“There is such a thing as social education and education outside of books; and this education is distinctly higher in India than in any part of Christendom. Through recitation of ancient stories and legends, through religious songs and passion plays, shows and pageants, through ceremonials and sacraments, through fairs and pilgrimages, the Hindu masses all over India receive a general culture and education which are in no way lower, but positively higher, than the general level of culture and education received through schools and newspapers, or even through the ministration of the Churches in Western Christian lands. It is an education, not in the so called three R’s, but in humanity.”

The English educated Indian little knew that the village economy did support and protect all vocations/occupatio ns, and not only Brahmins to the exclusion of other lower classes. He knew nothing about Henry VIII and his Statute which had prevented the reading of the English version of the Bible in Churches in preference to Latin version and even restricting its listening in English only to nobility and higher echelons of the society. The Statute (1542-43) ordained violation with serious consequences:

“….. The Bible shall not be read in English in any Church. No women or artificers, prentices, journeymen, servingmen of the degree of yeomen or under husbandsmen, nor labourers, shall read the New Testament in English. Nothing shall be taught or maintained contrary to the King’s instructions. And if any spiritual preach, teach, or maintain any thing contrary to the King’s instructions or determinations, made of ‘to be made, and shall be thereof convict, he shall for his first offence recant, `for his second abjure and bear a fagot, and for his third shall be adjudged an heretick, and be burned and lose all his goods and chattels.” . A.E. Dobbs, Education & Social Movement, 1700-1850, London, 1919, p. 105, quoting 34 and 35 Henry VIII.C.I.

During the same period, the expectations about education for a common man in England was -.

“….. a ploughman’s son will go to the plough, artificer’s son to apply the trade of his parents’ vocation; and the gentlemen’s children are meet to have the knowledge of Government and rule in the commonwealth. For we have as much need of ploughman as any other state; and all sorts of men may not go to school. ” (Emphasis ours)
– A.E.Dobbs, op.cit, p.. 104, p. 104, £n. 3 quoting Strype, Cramer, i.127.

Even up to the end of the l8th century, there were mote Sunday schools than Day schools in England and expection of education was limited to ‘that every child should be able to read the Bible’ as noted by Dobbs (op.cit, p. 139). The famous “Peel’s Act of 1802″ gave momentum to the day school movement. As a result the total number of schools in England both private and public, which in 1801 were about 3,363, rose to 46,000 in 1851. As against this situation in England, the reports of (a) Adam, a Christian missionary, who prepared a report on indigenous education in Bengal and Bihar (1835-38), (b) Reports prepared by British officers on indigenous education in Bombay Presidency (Iß20); (c) Extracts from Reports of British officers on indigenous education in Madras Presidency (1822-25), and (d) a much later work of G.W. Leitner on indigenous education in the Punjab (around 1880) confirm existence of adequate number of indigenous schools to meet the needs of the locality, in which not only Brahmins but students of all castes had their education. According to William Adam, there existed about one lac village schools in Bengal and Bihar. Thomas Munroe from Madras Presidency writes,”Every village had a school.” Around 1820, G.L. Prendergast from Bombay wrote “….. there is hardly a village, great or small, throughout our territory, in which there is not at least one school, and in largest villages more.” None of them talks of atrocities committed by Brahmins on lower castes ot discrimination on grounds of caste or of hegemony of Brahmins over education, or denial of education to lower classes and castes, They accepted the fact that there was certainly a higher percentage of Brahmins in schooLs, but not at the cost of denial of education to lower castes or classes.

The Industrial Revolution which was taking shape in Europe had absolutely no connection with Christianity as is made out by some. As a matter of fact, Christianity opposed science : Copernicus, Galileo and Bruno had to suffer because they did not accept the `Doctrine of Papacy’ and the `Gospel’ but expounded their own theories. However, the missionaries shrewdly juxtaposed Christianity and English education with the Industrial Revolution and science in Europe while educating Indians in India. The English educated Indians, who were becoming social reformers, not realizing the reality that Christianity had also equal or many more drawbacks and which had least contributed to the progress of science and technology, became gullible victims of the missionary propaganda. These new Indian reformists started equating drawbacks in the Hindu religion as obstacles in their scientific and technological progress. They also did not bother to know the contemporary status of education in England or in the West and whether the lower class of the society and weaker sections had easy access to quality education, which the nobility alone enjoyed as a special privilege. Refusal of the use of English against Latin in Church to the common man and burning of women by branding them as witches was never a part of information made available to Indians. The Biblical exhortation “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (Exodus, 22.18) was carried out with the fullest religious zeal, frenzy and fanaticism and Joan of Arc was burned as a witch and in 1484, Pope Innocent VIII, the most pious man (!) in the whole of Christendom, issued a Bull against witches and in the three centuries following it, i.e., the l6th, the l7th and the l8th, nearly three to twenty lacs of women were executed branding them as witches as reported by Encyclopaedia Americana, Vol. 29 (1984), p. 84. The English educated Indians cared little to know the inhuman atrocities committed by Christian missionaries in Goa and Kerala in the name of Inquisition. The English educated Indian did hardly know about the Crusades in Europe or about the empire of the Pope and his dabbling into political affairs of England and other countries of Europe.

Lesson To Be Learnt

 
Any study of history without studying the motives of these scholars, who were at the helm of affairs – be it education, law, administration or commerce, will be incomplete. Appreciation of their hard work, sincerity, devotion, conviction etc., should not in any way camouflage the truth while analysing the end results of their effects on India and Indian society. Decorating of poison does not qualify it for its consumption even by the thirstiest or the hungriest person to quench his thirst or hunger.
Did India need an education totally alien to its needs ? Was there no system of law existing in the country and the English were forced to design a new code of law ? Were the Indian land tenure and administrative systems of village governance inadequate for self support and self sufficiency ? These question do need an answer.
India is free for the last 45 years. We are in utter shambles. Our economy is doomed. Our education system has failed to culture the citizens of this country and it has only one function left- employing teachers for producing unemployed youths whose sole aim is to hunt for jobs. Socially we have become unsafe and our common man is facing loot, murder and dacoity as everyday features and our past two Prime Ministers fell victims to bullets and bomb blast. Politically we have been ruled as a democracy by elected representatives, many of whom may put to shame the anti-social elements. Our State is secular where every religion feels insecure. We have reduced a civilized country to a power-hungry, greedy, intolerant, short-sighted, confused, diffident, docile nation. Can we not change this picture and convert these very individuals into confident, creative, enthusiastic, foresighted, tolerant, contented, cultured individuals ? This is possible only if we possess an honest desire for our self-criticism and introspection and also have a strong desire to find out the true culprits for our misery. We got our freedom on August 15, 1947. Did our leaders at that time bring. in any radical changes i~ education, revenue, trade, foreign policy, law etc., which were shaped to suit the British ideals and interests as conquerors ? I am afraid, the leadership at that time. being a product of British education and admirers. of the .British, was overawed. by socialism, especially the type as practised in ‘the U.S.S.R., and could hardly think of giving a turn to several policies in their enthusiasm to occupy ministerial and other posts in Independent India ! Such a neglect on the part of our leaders, gave impetus to missionary activities aided by huge foreign funds and an urge to imitate West – all these factors have led us to the present-day miserable situation. Moreover, the advocates of Marxism and socialism – of various denominations, got all kinds of protection under a very sympathetic umbrella of such leadership. What the British and the missionaries could not achieve within 150 years of ruthless and tyrannical rule, was achieved in the post-independence period of five decades by our biased historians, politicians, sociologists and the ever enthusiastic media. The recent changes in the U.S.S.R., and other socialist countries in the West are not only relevant and educative to us but prove an eye-opener to us. What socialism did to religion, history and culture of the Russian people, and after 70 years what they feel about it, is highly significant. What unscrupulous methods were adopted, practised and advocated by these socialists as, enunciated by no less a leader than Lenin in achieving the goal of socialism may surprise many : On this point [ processes of social reality] Lenin wrote that ….nothing can be done without the masses. And in this era of printing and parliamentarism it is impossible to gain the following of the masses without a widely  ramified, systematically managed, well-equipped  system of flattery, lies, fraud, juggling with  fashionable and popular catchwords, and promising all manner of reforms and blessings to the workers right and left- as long as they renounce the revolutionary single for the overthrow of the bourgeoisie. ”  – Quoted by Y. Sogomonov P. Landesman, in  ‘ Nihilism Today’ published by Progress Publishers,  Moscow (1977), pp. 18-19. The original work is  translated from Russian into English by David  Skvirsky. It is the same methods the followers of Marx and Lenin have adopted in India during the last 40 years. Rationalist movement has truly nothing to do with rationality in life, but is a movement to spread atheism and anti-religionism. Anti-superstitious drive has little relationship to exposing pseudo-godman and protecting a believer from him. Instead it is geared up to uproot faith in God, branding faith itself as superstition. Women’s Lib. movement has truely nothing to do with development of woman’s personality but has resulted in anti-male, anti-family and self-centred feministic movement. The so-called scientific temperament and scientific movement has nothing to do with betterment and improving quality of life but is a propaganda of consumerism and dogmatic scienticism. All these movements were nourished and had a luxuriant growth infiltrating every strata of our thinking. Even the so-called rightists or pro-Hindu political parties have failed to understand the motives of all such movements. What else can be the tragedy? Instead of giving an intellectual fight against these movements, and exposing the fallacies in their logic, they prefer to jump on to the bandwagon of socialism itself? I have tried to explain how prior to Independence, from education, justice, village economy, land, revenue, and for that matter all aspects of human life were engineered by the British to suit the needs and aspirations of the British empire. How they created a system of education which in turn created an English educated Indian, who headed the reformist movement, we have seen. We have also seen how the idea of socialism, specially after Independence, continued to distort Indian history and has ultimately brought us to social, economic and political disaster.
Lastly, we have to think why Hindu culture and civilization could survive for thousands of years when other cultures and civilizations have formed part of history. This is only because Hindu dharma is not a religion confined to one book and one prophet. It neither depends for its protection on any individual sect or nation. Neither it vows to protect any sect or nation. The principles of Hindu dharma are not different in any way from human experiences. These principles are eternal.
The problem is that the Hindu dharma can never be effaced. It is we who may get effaced, if we do not take shelter under these eternal principles for our own protection and identity. And for the same identity and protection we have to see that our history and our values are not distorted

 

http://www.oriental thane.com/ speeches/ speech_7. htm

Akbar, The Great (?)

 

Date:	Tue, 26 Feb 2008 21:20:13 +0530
From:	“Sanatan Dharma” <hindureligion@gmail.com>  Add Mobile Alert
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Subject:	_/\_ *Hindu Religion* Akbar, The Great:A Tyrannical Monarch

Akbar, The Great
A Tyrannical Monarch

Introduction

History of India has witnessed innumerable invasions by hoards of armed marauders coming in from the west, perhaps attracted to the riches and wealth India then possessed. Apart from looting of wealth and destruction of property, the ‘aliens’ who remained, who committed grave atrocities against the local populace, and themselves, wallowing in immoral and unethical behaviour; except for one, it is said, Akbar.

Akbar, the third generation Moghal emperor who lived from 1542-1605 A.D, has been extolled as the greatest of all Moghals, righteous in deed and noble in character. He is praised to be the only and truly secular Emperor of the times, very caring and protective of his subjects. However, assessment and analysis of contemporary notings expose this unjustified edification of Akbar and provides a remarkably different picture of Akbar’s personality.

The following is not a comprehensive report on Akbar’s reign, but an attempt to provide a summary to the reader, on the real nature of Akbar based on contemporary records. It is hoped that the reader will make a judgement on Akbar’s “greatness” based on the information provided below.

Akbar’s Ancestors

Akbar’s ancestors were barbarous and vicious, and so were his descendants like Aurangzeb and others’ down the line. Akbar was born and brought up in a illiterate and foul atmosphere characterized by excessive drinking, womanizing and drug addiction. Vincent Smith in “Akbar – The Great Mogul” (p.294) writes, ” Intemperance was the besetting sin of the Timuroid royal family, as it was of many other muslim ruling houses. Babur (was) an elegant toper … Humayun made himself stupid with opium … Akbar permitted himself the practices of both vices .. Akbar’s two sons died in early manhood from chronic alcoholism, and their elder brother was saved from the same fate by a strong constitution, and not by virtue.” With such an atmosphere to nourish Akbar’s thoughts, it is rather unsual for Akbar to become “divine incarnate”!

Describing the demoniac pleasure which Babur used to derive by raising towers of heads of people he used to slaughter, Col. Tod writes that after defeating Rana Sanga at Fatehpur Sikri “triumphal pyriamids were raised of the heads of the slain, and on a hillock which overlooked the field of the battle, a tower of skulls was erected and the conquerer Babur assumed the title of Ghazi.” (p.246). Akbar seems to have preserved this “great” legacy of erecting minarets as is obvious from the accounts of battles he fought.

Humayun, the son of Babar, was even more degenerate and cruel than his father. After repeated battles, Humayum captured his elder brother Kamran and subjected the latter to brutal torture. A detailed account is left by Humayun’s servant Jauhar and is quoted by Smith (p.20), which says, ” .. (Humayun) had little concerns for his brother’s sufferings .. One of the men was sitting on Kamran’s knees. He was pulled out of the tent and a lancet was thrust into his eyes .. Some lemon juice and salt was put into his eyes .. After sometime he was put on horseback.” One can imagine the cruelty and torture that Humayun was capable of inflicting on others when he subjected to his own brother to such atrocities. Humayun was also a slave to opium habit, engaged in excessive alcohol consumption and a lecherous degenarate when it came to women (Shelat, p.27). He is also known to have married a 14 year old Hamida Begum by force. The cruelties perpetrated by of Akbar’s descendants (Jehangir, Shahjahan, Aurangzeb, etc.) are not entirely different from those of his ancestors. Having brought up in the company and under the guidance of a lineage of drug addicts, drunkards and sadists, it is rather anamalous that Akbar held such a gentle and noble character. Even assuming that he fancied nobility, it is amazing that Akbar let his comtemporaries and Generals, like Peer Mohammad, loot and rape the helpless citizenry that he was ruling! It would however be interesting to observe the incidents in Akbar’s reign and evaluate his character.

Akbar’s (Immoral) Character and Nature

Akbar possessed a inordinate lust for women, just like his ancestors and predecessors. One of Akbar’s motives during his wars of aggression against various rulers was to appropriate their women, daughters and sisters. The Rajput women of Chittor prefered “Jauhar” (immolation) than to be captured and disrespectfully treated as servants and prostitutes in Akbar’s harem. On his licentous relations with women, Smith refers to a contemporary Jesuits testimony (p.81) thus, “… Akbar habitually drank hard. The good father had boldly dared to reprove the emperor sharply for his licentous relations with women. Akbar instead of resenting the priests audacity, blushingly excused himself.” Both drinking and enganging in debauched sexual activities was inherited by Akbar from his ancestors.

Abul Fazl in Ain-i-Akbari (Blochmann,V.1,p.276), “.. His majesty has established a wine shop near the palace … The prostitues of the realm collected at the shop could scarcely be counter, so large was their number .. The dancing girls used to be taken home by the courtiers. If any well known courtier wanted to have a virgin they should first have His Majesty’s [Akbar’s] permission. In the same way, boys prostituted themselves, and drunkeness and ignorance soon lead to bloodshed … His Majesty [Akbar] himself called some of the prostitutes and asked them who had deprived them of their virginity?” This was the state of affairs during Akbar’s rule, where alcoholism, sodomy, prostitution and murderous assaults were permitted by the king himself. The conditions of the civic life during Akbar’s life is shocking!

Sodomy was a precious service of Akbar’s own family. Babur, Akbar’s grandfather, has given a lengthy description of this sodomic infatuation for a male sweetheart. Humayun was no different. Though perhaps Akbar did not engage in sodomy, he “allowed” it to be practiced by his servants, courtiers and sycophats. Abul Fazal in Ain-e-Akbari provides accounts of some such acts which are too disgusting to even mention. Such perverse gratification was prevelant during the Moghal rule, and in Akbar’s times.

That Akbar remained monogamous throughout his life is indeed history falsified myth. Again quoting V.Smith (pp.47),”.. Akbar, throughout his life, allowed himself ample latitude in the matter of wives and concubines!” and further, ” Akbar had introduced a whole host of Hindu the daughters of eminent Hindu Rajah’s into his harem.” (pp.212). An account of how the Jaipur rulers were coerced into sending their daughters to the Mogul harem is found in Dr. Srivastava’s book Akbar – The Mogul (Vol.1). Shelat notes (p.90),” (after the “Jauhar” that followed the killing of Rani Durgawati) the two women left alive, Kamalavati (sister of Rani Durgawati) and the daughter of the Raja of Purangad (daughter-in-law of the deceased queen) were sent to Agra to enter Akbar’s harem.” It should also be observed that adimittance into Akbar’s harem was available mainly to virgins and others’ were “disqualified”. Inspite of such disgusting and lewd personal affairs, inducting women of abducted or killed Hindu warriors into his harem as slaves and prostitutes, it is bewildering that Akbar is hailed as a righteous and noble emperor.

The personality and nature of Akbar has been nicely summed up by the Editor of Father Monserrate’s Commentarius. The editor’s introduction states, “In the long line of Indian soverigns, the towering personalities of Ashoka and Akbar (because of his dread) stand high above the rest… Akbar’s greed for conquest and glory and his lack of sincerity form a marked contrast to Ashoka’s paternal rule, genuine self-control and spiritual ambition. Akbar’s wars were those of a true descendent of Timur, and had all the gruesome associations which this fact implies.”

“The old notion that Akbar’s was a near approximation to Plato’s philosopher king has been dissipated by modern resarches. His character with its mixture of ambition and cunning has now been laid bare. He has been rightly compared to a pike in a pond preying upon his weaker neighbours .. Akbar was unable to give up his polygamous habits, for no importance needs to be attached to the bazaar gossip of the time that he once intended to distribute his wives among his grandees.”

Whole of India was reduced to a brothel during the Moghal rule and Akbar, one of the Emperors, is being glorified as one of the patrons of the vast brothel. The above instances may suffice to convince the impartial reader that Akbar’s whole career was a saga of uninhibited licentiousness backed by the royal brute.

Akbar’s Barbarites

Glancing at the events in the reign of Akbar, it is a compelling deduction that he was no less cruel a tyrant than any of his ancestors. With his trecherous nature and the unlimited power than he wielded over a vast region qualifies him to be one of the foremost tyrants and sadists in India’s history, or perhaps, even world history.

Vincent Smith (p.50) says that in a privately executing Kamran’s son [namely, Akbar’s own cousin] at Gwalior in 1565, “.. Akbar set an evil example, initiated on a large scale by his descendents Shahjahan and Aurangzeb.” This does not cause a serious alarm knowing the percious heritage of duplicity and trechery handed down to Akbar by his ancestors. Generations of martial races (Rajputs) were cut off by his (Akbar) sword … he was long ranked with Shahbuddin and Alla (Allauddin) and other instruments of destruction, and with every just claim; and like these he constructed a Mumbar (a pulpit for islamic preachers) for the Koran from the altar of Eklingji (the deity of the Rajput warriors).” (Todd, p.259) Not only that he forcibly annihilated innumerable humans, he also had no respect for temples and deities and willingly indulged in destruction of such places of worship.

That Akbar refused to strike a helpless and injured prisoner seems to be utterly false. At an tender age of 14, Akbar slashed the neck of his Hindu adversary Hemu brought before him unconcious and bleeding. After the fateful battle of Panipat, the unconcious Hemu was brought before Akbar who smote Hemu on his neck with his scimitar, and in Akbar’s presence, the bystanders also plunged their swords into the bleeding corpse. Hemu’s head was sent to Kabul and his trunk was gibbeted at one of the gates of Delhi. After victorious forces pushing south from Panipat after that great victory (at Panipat), writes Smith (pp.29), “marched straight into Delhi, which opened its gates to Akbar, who made his entry in state. Agra was also passed into his possession. In accordance with the ghastly custom of the times, a tower was built with the heads of the slain. Immense treasures were taken with the family of Hemu whose aged father was executed.” This “tower of heads” tradition and ceremony was religuously preserved by the “magnanimous” Akbar.

After the capture of Chittor, says Smith (p.64), “.. Akbar exasperated by the obstinate resistance offered to his arms, treated the town and garrison with merciless severity. The 8000 strong Rajput garrison having been zealously helped during the seige by 40,000 peasants, the emperor ordered a general massacre which resulted in the death of of 30,000 (even thought the struggle was over). Many were made prisoners.” Such terrible was his humanitarian outlook as towards his defeated adverseries. L.M. Shelat writes more on this incident that (pp.105), “neither the temples nor the towers escaped the vandalism of the invaders”. There were events where intolerant Akbar ordered the excision of one man’s tongue, trampling opponents to death by elephants and other private or informal executions and assacinations. After a victorious battle at Ahemadabad, in accordance with the gruesome custom at the times, a pyramid was built with the heads of the rebels, more than 2000 in number. At one time, enraged on seeing a hapless lamplighter coiled up near his couch, Akbar order that the servant be shreded into thousand pieces! What else can one expect the barbaric and unscrupulous Akbar?

Akbar’s reign of horrid cruelties includes the following incident which must be considered the jewel in the crown of horrid pastimes. Vincent Smith writes (pp.56) “An extraordinary incident which occured in April while the royal camp was at Thanesar, the famous Hindu place of pilgrimage to the north of Delhi, throws a rather unpleasant light on Akbar’s character… The Sanyasins assembled at the holy tank were divided into two parties, called the Kurs and Puris. The leader of the latter complained to the King that that the Kurs had unjustly occupied the accustomed sitting place of the Puris who were thus debarred from collecting the pilgrims’ alms.” They were asked to decide the issue by mortal combat. They were drawn up on either side with their arms drawn. In the fight that ensued the combatants used swords, bows, arrows and stones. “Akbar seeing that the Puris were outnumbered gave a signal to some of his savage followers to help the weaker party.” In this fight between the two Hindu sanyasin sects Akbar saw to it that both were ultimately annihilated by his own fierce soilders. The chronicler unctuously adds that Akbar was highly delighted with this sport. How can an emperor, so noble and great, can have a sadist mind that relishes and obtains “delight” by ordaining and watching two Hindu sanyansin sects being slaughtered?

Killing and massacring others’ was regarded as a pastime and diversion by a bereaved Akbar. The chronicler Ferishta notes (Briggs, p.171), “Prince Murad Mirza falling dangerously ill (May 1599) was buried at Shapoor. The corpse was afterwards removed to Agra, and laid by the side of Humayun, the prince’s grandfather. The kings grief for the death of his son increased his desire for the conquering the Deccan, as a means of diverting the mind.” Could there exist a more sinister kind of sadism?

Akbar’s cruelty towards the Hindu women kidnapped and shut up in his harem were stagerring and his much vaunted marraiges said to have been contracted for communal integration and harmony were nothing but outrageous kidnappings brought about with the force of arms. This is apparent from Akbar’s marriage to Raja Bharmal’s daughter that occured at Deosa “when people Deosa and other places on Akbar’s route fled away on his approach.” (Shrivastava, pp.63). Why would the people flee in terror if at all Akbar was “visiting” Raja Bharmal and that the marraige was congenial and in consent with the bride’s party? Far from abolishing the practice of Sati, Akbar invited the Jesuit priests to watch the “considerble fun” and supporting it by his weighty judgement and explicit approbation. (Monserrate’s Commentary, pp.61).

Many more horried facts on Akbar’s rule can be added. Even the infamous tax, which supposedly was abolished by Akbar, was continually being collected in Akbar’s reign. A number of persons were secretly executed on Akbar’s orders and a list of such people is provided by Vincent Smith. Akbar’s reign was nothing but terror, torture and tyranny for his subjects and courtiers as is obvious from the quoted events. There are numerous other occasions and recorded events from Akbar’s life that personifies him as a devil incarnate, contrary to what has been propagated.

Akbar’s Fanaticism

Akbar was born a muslim, lived like a muslim and died as a muslim; that too a very fanatic one. Histories have dubbed him as a true believer who accomplished a synthesis of the best principles of all religions. The infamous Jiziya tax, which is special tax exaction from the Hindus, was never abolished by Akbar. Time and time again different people had approached seeking exemption from Jiziya. Everytime the exemption was ostensibly issued, but never was actually implemented. Throughout Akbar’s reign, temples used to razed to the ground or misappropriated as mosques and cows were slaughtered in them, as happened in the battle at Nagarkot. No symbol of Hindu origin and design was spared from the iconoclastic wrath of Akbar.

Xavier, a Jesuit in Akbar’s court, gives a typical instance of Akbar’s perfidy in making people drink water in which his feet had been washed. Xavier writes, says Smith (p.189), Akbar posed ” as a Prophet, wishing it to be understood that he works miracles through healing the sick by means of the water in which he washed the feet.” Badauni says that this [the above] special type of humiliation was reserved by Akbar only for Hindus. Says Badayuni, “… if other than Hindus came, and wished to become disciples at any sacrifice, His Majesty reproved them.” Where was his broadminded and tolerant nature then?

Yet another Xavier’s letter (MacLagan, p.57 and Du Jarric, p.90) states, “The Christian fathers got little opportunity of holding religious discussions with Akbar or influencing him in favour of Christianity …Akbar silenced Xavier by telling him that the freedom accorded to him in preaching his religion was itself a great service.” Akbar was not at all a tolerant of other religious faiths.

Akbar had filled both his hands with 50 gold coins when Badayuni expressed his strong desire to take part in a “holy war” (massacring Hindus) and “dye these black moustachois and beard in (hindu) blood through loyalty to Your Majesty’s person” (sic). Akbar far from dispproving of Badayuni’s despicable desire, gladly presented him with a decent premium.

The Hindus were treated as thirdclass citizens in Akbar’s reign is evident from the Ain-i-Akbari. Abul Fazal writes, “… he [Husayn Khan, Akbar’s governer at Lahore] ordered the Hindus as unbelievers to wear a patch (Tukra) near the shoulders, and thus got the nick name of Tukriya (patcher).” (Bochmann., p.403) The patch was obviously to mark the “unbelievers” out as pariahs for providing special degrading treatment.

The holy Hindu cities of Prayag and Banaras, writes Vincent Smith (p.58), were plundered by Akbar because their residents were rash enough to close their gates! No wonder Prayag of today has no ancient monuments — whatever remain are a rubble! It is rather obvious that Akbar had no respect and reverance for cities considered holy by Hindus, let alone esteem for human life and property. Also, it is evident from this instance that Akbar’s subjects were horrified and scared upon the arrival of their king into their city. If at all Akbar was so magnanimous, why then did not the people come forward and greet him?

Monserrate, a contemporary of Akbar, writes (p.27), “the religious zeal of the Musalmans has destroyed all the idol temples which used to be numerous. In place of Hindu temples, countless tombs and little shrines of wicked and worthless Musalmans have been erected in which these men are worshipped with vain superstition as though they were saints.” Not only did the muslims destroy the idols, but usurped the existing temples and converted them into tombs of insignificant people.

Akbar has neither any love or compassion for Hindus as is apparent from the above examples. Hindus were openly despised and contemptously treated under Akbar’s fanatical rule as under any other rule. Akbar was only one of the many links of the despotic and cruel Moghal rule in India, and enforced the tradition of his forefathers with sincerity and equal ruthlessness.

Akbar’s (mal) Administration

Akbar was so penurious and retentive of money that ..” he considered himself to be heir of all his subjects, and ruthlessly seized the property of every deceased whose family had to make a fresh start … Akbar was a hard headed man of business, not a sentimental philanthropist, and his whole policy was directed principally to the aquisition of power and riches. All the arrangements about Jagirs, branding (horses) etc., were devised for the one purpose namely, the enhancement of the power, glory and riches of the crown.” (Smith, p.263). The latter statement indicates what a marvellous and altruist administrator Akbar was!

Akbar’s lawless and rapacious rule also led to horrible famines — Delhi was devastated and the mortality was enormous. Gujrat, one of the richest provinces in India, suffered severly for 6 months in 1573-74. Smith writes, “The famine which began in 1595 and lasted three or four years until 1598 equalled in its horrors the accession year and excelled the visitation by reason of its longer duration. Inundation and epidemics occasionally marred Akbar’s reign.” And Akbar is said to have done nothing to ameliorate the sufferings of the masses, instead accumulated all the wealth he had amassed into forts and palaces.

Refering to the Gujarat famine, Dr. Shrivastava (p.169) writes, “… the famine was not caused by drought or the failure of seasonal rains, but was due to the destruction wrought by prolonged wars and rebellions, constant marching and counter-marching of troops, and killing men on a large scale, and the breakdown of admnistrative machinary and the economic system … The mortality rate was so high that on an average 100 cart-loads of dead bodies were taken out for burial in the city of Ahemadabad alone ..”

Smith asserts that epidemics and inundiation often marred Akbar’s reign, and at the time of such distress, writes Badayuni (Blochmann, p.391), parents were allowed to sell their children. Utter lawlessness and stately permissions to carry out immoral activities seem to the norm during Akbar’s reign. Deadly pestilence and frightful famine appeared on the scene from time to time and lasted for years together, due to Akbar’s callous and inadequate administrative capacities.

Noble in character that Akbar was that his generals and courtiers, even including his son Jehangir, revolted against him. Interminable wars and unending rebellions were continuing somewhere or the other in his so-called peaceful reign. Dr. Shrivastava nicely summarizes (p.381) , “The vast empire hardly ever enjoyed complete immunity from some kind of disturbance and rebellion. Some chief or the other taking advantage of slackness of administration, lack of vigillance … or the occurance of a natural calamity raised its head in revolt. It is tedious to recount cases of civil disturbance.”. On an occasion of an accident, rumours spread about the seriousness of the injury and possibly the death of Akbar which caused revolts and rebellions in distant parts of the country, and many paraganas were plundered by turbulent people!

Had Akbar been do generous as he is often made out to be and his reign so just and kind, peace and contentment should have prevailed during his lifetime and upon his death, the subjects should have looked upon his children with devotion love and respect. However, due to nature of Akbar’s rapacious rule, everyone from princes to paupers wished to overthrow Akbar.

The (usurped) Buildings

With constant famines, wars and revolts occuring the Akbar’s era, where then did he get the time and money to construct buildings of magnificence and grandeur, like the Fort at Agra ? Akbar is said to have built several forts and palaces and founded many townships. However, as seen earlier, Akbar simply renamed pre-existing townships of Hindu origin and claimed to have been built by himself.

One such unfortunate township is that of Fatehpur Sikri. It has a massive defensive wall around it, enclosing redstone gateways and a majestic palace complex, explicitly in the Rajput style. It is the creation of these buildings and gateways that are accredited to Akbar. Fatehpur Sikri (or Fatehpur/Sikri) was an ancient independent principality before its occupation by the muslims. Testifying to this Todd says (p.240), ” [Rana Sangram Singh] came to the Mewar throne in 1509 A.D. Eighty thousand horses, seven Rajas of the highest rank, nine Raos and 104 cheiftains, bearing the titles of Rawal and Rawut with 500 elephants follwed him into the field (against Babur). The princess of Marwar and Amber did him homage, and the Raos of Gwalior, Ajmer, *Sikri* … served him as tributaries ..” The above passage makes it clear that even during the reign of Akbar’s grandfather Babur, Sikri was ruled by a “Rao”, who owed allegiance to Rana Sangram Singh of Mewar. Another reference to Fatehpur Sikri is of the year 1405 (150 years before Akbar) when Ikbal Khan was killed and his head was sent to Fatehpur (E&D, p.40). Also it is stated (E&D, p.44) that Khizr Khan (the founder of Sayyad dynasty, 1500 A.D.) remained in *Fatehpur* and did not go to Delhi. Even Babur has stated that Agra and *Sikri* housed several palaces equally magnificent (E&D, p.223). These 15th century references will, for now, suffice to prove the existence of Fatehpur Sikri before even Akbar was born, and that the beautiful buildings were not built by Akbar.

The Red Fort of Agra, also originally of Rajput design and construction, was usurped by Akbar. However, an account says that Akbar demolished the fort in 1565, apparently for no reason, and constructed another in its place. Surprisingly, in 1566, Adham Khan was punished by being thrown down from the second storey of the royal apartments inside the fort! Keene (Handbook for Visitor’s to Agra and Its Neighbourhood) quotes this rumour and casts a very pertinent doubt that is the fort was demolished in 1565, how is it possible for Akbar to stay there in 1566 and a man was flung down from the second story? Keene adds that even the foundation of the extensive fort could not have been complete within three years. Neither did Akbar demolish the fort, nor did he rebuild an entire structure. He simply comandeered the fort from its original inhabitants, and claimed to have been built by him.

Similarly, the palaces and mansions in Ajmer, Allahabad, Manoharpur and other townships were simply usurped by Akbar. He never ordered engineers and architects to build to build magnificent buildings. Testifying to this, Monserrate in his Commentarius (p.16) remarks, “.. musalmans whose nature is indeed that of barbarians, take no interest in such things (erecting massive and ornate buildings and townships). Their chronicles being scanty and unreliable and full of old wives tales…” The fraudulent claims that Akbar designed and built these monuments are fabricated stories written by muslim chroniclers toadying for Akbar’s favours.

Summary

Akbar’s life has been full of acts of cruelties, barbaric behaviour, lust for women and wine. Considering the background in which Akbar was brought up and the environment in which he lived, it was indeed a surprise that he would develop qualities of compassion and love. Even assuming that such miracles can occur, unfortunately, Akbar’s reign and state of administration contradict such an assumption and one is compelled to conclude that Akbar was no better a monarch than his forefathers. Apparently from what was described above, Akbar has been given unecessary credit of being tolerant, secular and an altruist king. His sycophantic courtiers, including the court chroniclers, alloted to him all the praises he desired. Upon some inspection, the nine-gem story of Akbar’s court becomes a sheer invention of court flatterers, who sought Akbar’s favour for self-aggrandizement. Akbar’s recalcitrance and callousless in the matters of caring for his subjects and domain, led to untold misery in the form of famines and pestilence. Wars, revolts and rebellions constantly erupted concluding is mass mayhem and killings. There was no tranquility nor peace in Akbar’s reign, let alone material and spiritual prosperity. That an avaricious miser Akbar was, it is rather unbelievable for him to have spent on creating expensive buildings and mansions. He was no better than other muslim monarchs, constantly on the prey to usurp power and pelf by whatever means they could. Morality and humanitarian principles took a back seat to self aggrandizement and lechery. Even after exercising numerous abductions, kidnappings, murders Akbar have been refered to as noble, compassionate and great. Even though religious fanatism never decreased in his reign, nay, was sponsored by Akbar himself, he has been termed as a secular, broadminded person. Such blunders of a serious magnitude have been committed by historians reconstructing and writing accounts on Indian history.

It may be worthwhile to research and present the “true” story of Akbar exposing to the world the true nature of Akbar and his personality. The Moghal rule in India was indeed very ruthless and full of difficult times for the people and the country; truly a “dark” age.

References

Smith, V., “Akbar, The Great Mogul,” 2nd Edition, S.Chand and Co., Delhi, 1958.

Todd, James.,“Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan,” 2 volumes, Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd., London, 1957.

Shelat J.M, “Akbar,” Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan, 1964, Bombay.

Blochmann, H., “Ain-e-Akbari,” translation of Abul Fazal’s Persian text, 2nd Edition, Bibliotheca Indica Series, published by the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal.

Briggs, John, “History of Mahomedan Power in India (till the year 1612 A.D),” Vol.2, Translated from the original Persian of Mahomad bin Ferishta, S. Dey Publication, Calcutta, 1966.

Shrivastava, A.L., “Akbar the Great,” Vol.1, Shiv Lal Agarwal and Co., Agra.

Monserrate S.J., “The Commentary,” translated from original Latin by J.S. Hoyland, annotated by S.Banerjee, Humphrey Milford, Oxford Univ. Press, London, 1922.

Blochmann H., “Ain-i-Akbari” edited by D.C Phillot, Calcutta, 1927.

Elliot and Dowson,” Tuzak-i-Babari”, Vol.4.

http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/modern/akbar_ppg.html

Resources for the Study of Indian History

http://www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/h_es/h_es_indian_hist_frameset.htm

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My Dear Hindus,

History is to learn from and get smart in our understanding of the truth, the goals, the interests, and the actions, so that we do not suffer again, what we suffered in the past.  Here is the history of Hindu Holocaust.  Keep in mind that the ideology and actions of Islam that is a root cause of our past sufferings has not changed a single bit since the birth of Islam.  As a solution, one thing we Hindus could do is to know our Sanatana Dharma well, practice it well and correctly, spread it well, and expose the barbaric inhuman ideology of Islam to the world.  Jai Sanatana Dharma!  Jai Sri Krishna!  – S. Vyas

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Hindu Holocaust
Source:  http://www.ghen.net/forum/Hindu History
Holocaust of Hindus
During the Muslim Occupation of India 
by Sudheer Birodkar

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“The massacres perpetuated by Muslims in India are unparalleled in history, bigger than the Holocaust of the Jews by the Nazis; or the massacre of the Armenians by the Turks; more extensive even than the slaughter of the South American native populations by the invading Spanish and Portuguese.”   – Francois Gautier
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This page is dedicated to the memory of those men, women and children who were killed or were captured or converted by force to Islam over a period of fourteen centuries in India and in other parts of the globe. These men, women and children cannot be recalled for standing witness to what was done to them by the swordsmen of Islam.

Hence we are going to rely on Muslim historians, in India and abroad, who have written hundreds of glowing accounts of the devastation caused by the progress of Islamic armies across the world (and in India). As our focus is India, we are going to look only at what happened in India during the Islamic invasion and the following struggle for independence from Islamic rule that was waged by the Hindus. A pronounced feature of these Muslim histories is a description – in smaller or greater detail but always with considerable pride – of how the Hindus were slaughtered en masse or converted by force, how hundreds of thousands of Hindu men and women and children were captured as booty and sold into slavery, how Hindu temples and monasteries were razed to the ground or burnt down, and how images of Hindu Gods and Goddesses were destroyed or desecrated.

Commandments of Allah (Quran) and precedents set by the Prophet (Sunnah) are frequently cited by the authors in support of what the swordsmen and demolition squads of Islam did with extraordinary zeal, not only in the midst of war but also, and more thoroughly, after Islamic rule had been firmly established.

Almost all medieval Muslim historians credit their heroes with desecration of Hindu idols and/or destruction of Hindu temples. The picture that emerges has the following components, depending upon whether the iconoclast was in a hurry on account of Hindu resistance or did his work at leisure after a decisive victory:

1. The idols were mutilated or smashed or burnt or melted down if they were made of precious metals;

2. Sculptures in relief on walls and pillars were disfigured or scraped away or torn down;

3. Idols of stone and inferior metals or their pieces were taken away, sometimes by cartloads, to be thrown down before the main mosque in

(a) the metropolis of the ruling Muslim sultan, and

(b) The holy cities of Islam, particularly Mecca, Medina and Baghdad;

4. There were instances of idols being turned into lavatory seats or handed over to butchers to be used as weights while selling meat;

5. Brahmin priests and other holy men in and around the temple were molested or murdered;

6. Sacred vessels and scriptures used in worship were defiled and scattered or burnt:

7. Temples were damaged or despoiled or demolished or burnt down or converted into mosques with some structural alterations or entire mosques were raised on the same sites mostly with temple materials;

8. Cows were slaughtered on the temple sites so that Hindus could not use them again.

This essay is to enable us to remember the sacrifice of those who attained Veergati (Martyrdom) when faced against these forces of darkness that represented religious bigotry that traumatized and tormented India and other parts of our globe for Fourteen Hundred years. India has survived as a wounded civilization to tell the story of this chilling horror. A horror that seems too cruel to be true. The unfortunate part is that it was true and this would become true once more in the future, if the forces of malevolence again get the upper hand in India or in any part of the world.

This essay has been compiled from the writings of a cross section of Historians comprising Sir Jadunath Sarkar , Rizwan Salim, Sita Ram Goel, Ram Swarup, Arun Shourie, R.C. Mazumdar and a few others.

Epigraphic Evidence of the Construction of Masjids by destroying Hindu temples

There are many mosques all over India which are known to local tradition and the Archaeological Survey of India as built on the site of and, quite frequently, from the materials of, demolished Hindu temples. Most of them carry inscriptions invoking Allah and the Prophet, quoting the Quran and giving details of when, how and by whom they were constructed. The inscriptions have been deciphered and connected to their historical context by learned Muslim calligraphers. They have been published by the Archaeological Survey of India in its Epigraphica Indica Arabic and Persian Supplement.

The following few inscriptions have been selected in order to show that:

(1) destruction of Hindu temples continued throughout the period of Muslim domination;

(2) it covered all parts of India – east, west, north, and south; and

(3) all Muslim dynasties, imperial and provincial, participated in the “pious performance”.

1. Qu’wat al-Islam Masjid, Qutub Minar, Delhi:

“This fort was conquered and the Jami Masjid built in the year 587 A.H (Hejira Era) by the  Amir Qutub-ud-din Aibak the slave of the Sultan, Shahabuddin Ghori. According to the Epigraphica Indica Arabic and Persian Supplement (1909-10, pp.3-4): “The materials of 27 idol temples, on each of which 2,000,000 Delhiwals had been spent were used in the (construction of) the mosque…” The year 587 H. corresponds to 1192 A.D. “Delhiwal was a high-denomination coin current at that time in Delhi.

2. Masjid at Manvi in the Raichur District of Karnataka by Firuz Shah Bahmani:

“Praise be to Allah that by the decree of the Parvardigar, a mosque has been converted out of a temple as a Sign of religion in the reign of…the Sultan who is the asylum of Faith Firuz Shah Bahmani who is the cause of exuberant spring in the garden of religion” (1962, pp.56-57). The inscription mentions the year 1406-07 A.D. as the time of construction.

3. Jami Masjid at Malan, Palanpur Taluka, Banaskantha District of Gujarat by Khan-i-Azam Ulugh Khan:

“The Jami Masjid was built by Khan-i-Azam Ulugh Khan…who suppressed the wretched infidels. He eradicated the idolatrous houses and mine of infidelity, along with the idols…with the edge of the sword, and made ready this edifice… he made its walls and doors out of the idols; the back of every stone became the place for prostration of the believer” (1963, pp.26-29). The date of construction is mentioned as 1462 A.D. in the reign of Mahmud Shah I (Begada) of Gujarat.

4. Hammam Darwaza Masjid at Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh in the reign of Akbar, the Great Mughal:

“Thanks that by the guidance of the everlasting and living (Allah), this house of infidelity became the niche of prayer. As a reward for that, the Generous Lord constructed an abode for the builder in paradise” (1969, P 375). Its chronogram yields the year 1567 A.D. in the reign Akbar, the Great Mughal.

A local historian, Fasih-ud-Din, tells us that the temple had been built earlier by Diwan Chaman Das, an official of the Mughal Government.

5. Jami Masjid at Ghoda in the Poona District of  Maharashtra by Mir Muhammad Zaman:

“O Allah! O Muhammad! O Ali! When Mir Muhammad Zaman made up his mind, he opened the door of prosperity on himself by his own hand. He demolished thirty three idol temples (and) by divine grace laid the foundation of a building in this abode of perdition” (1933-34, p.24). The inscription is dated 1586 A.D. when the Poona region was ruled by the Nizam Shahi sultans of Ahmadnagar.

6. Gachinala Masjid at Cumbum in the Kurnool District of Andhra Pradesh by Muhammad Shah:

“He is Allah, may he be glorified…During the august rule of…Muhammad Shah, there was a well-established idol-house in Kuhmum…Muhammad Salih who prospers in the rectitude of the affairs of the Faith…razed to the ground, the edifice of the idol-house and broke the idols in a manly fashion. He constructed on its site a suitable mosque, towering above the buildings of all” (1959-60, pp.64-66). The date of construction is mentioned as 1729-30 A.D. in the reign of the Mughal Emperor Muhammad Shah.

Though sites of demolished Hindu temples were mostly used for building mosques and Idgahs; temple materials were often used in other Muslim monuments as well. Archaeologists have discovered such materials, architectural as well as sculptural, in quite a few forts, palaces, maqbaras, Sufi khanqahs, madrasas, etc.

In Srinagar, Kashmir, temple materials can be seen in long stretches of the stone embankments on both sides of the Jhelum.

The inscriptions on the walls of the Gopi Talav, a stepped well at Surat, tell us that the well was constructed by Haidar Quli, the Mughal governor of Gujarat, in 1718 A.D. in the reign of Farrukh Siyar. One of them says that its bricks were taken from an idol temple”. The other informs us that Hiaider Quli Khan, during whose period tyranny has become extinct, laid waste several idol temples in order to make this strong building firm…” (1933-34. pp.37-44).

THE TEMPLE OF KHANDOBA AT JEJURI
This was one of the many temples that had been destroyed and converted into a Mosque by the Muslim aggressors.

Shivaji Maharaj reconverted it into a temple. Even today, the temple structure displays a mix of Hindu and Muslim architecture. But in spite of the trying circumstances of religious bigotry of the Muslim aggressors in which he operated, Shivaji Maharaj never disrespected the Muslim faith. Whenever a copy of the holy Koran fell into the hands of Maratha troops, Shivaji Maharaj had given strict instructions to treat it with utmost respect and hand it over to the local Maulavis (Muslim priests).

For related graphic visit the site:
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Literary Evidence

Literary evidence of Islamic iconoclasm vis-a-vis Hindu places of worship is far more extensive. It covers a 1onger span of time, from the fifth decade of the 7th century to the closing years of the eighteenth. It also embraces a larger space, from Transoxiana in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south, and from Afghanistan the west to Assam in the east.

Deception practiced by some Historians

Pseudo-secularist “historians” and Muslim apologists would have us believe that medieval Muslim annalists were indulging in poetic exaggerations in order to please their pious patrons. But archaeological explorations in modern times have, however, provided physical proofs of literary descriptions.

The vast cradle of Hindu culture is literally littered with ruins of temples and monasteries belonging to all sects of Sanatana Dharma- Buddhist, Jain, Saiva, Sakta, Vaishnava and the rest.

The literary sources, like the epigraphic, provide evidence of the elation which Muslims felt while witnessing or narrating these “pious deeds”. A few citations from Amir Khusro will illustrate the point. The instances cited relate to the doings of Jalalud-Din Firuz Khilji, Alaud-Din Khilji and the latter’s military commanders. Khusro served as a court-poet of six successive sultans at Delhi and wrote a masnavi in praise of each after he had murdered his predecessor. Khusro was the dearest disciple of Shaikh Nizamud-Din Awliya and has come to be honoured as a great sufi himself.

In our own times, Khusro is being hailed as the father of a composite Hindu-Muslim culture and the pioneer of secularism. Dr. R.C. Majumdar, whom the Pseudo-secularists malign as a “communalist historian” names him as a “liberal Muslim’.

Here is what Amir Khusro has written:

1. Jhain: “Next morning he (Jalal-ud-din went again to the temples and ordered their destruction … While the soldiers sought every opportunity of plundering, the Shah was engaged in burning the temples and destroying the idols. There were two bronze idols of Brahma, each of which weighed more than a thousand mans (a measure of weight). These were broken into pieces and the fragments were distributed among the officers with orders to throw them down at the gates of the Masjid on their return (to Delhi)” (Miftab-ul-Futub)

2. Devagiri: “He (Ala-ud-Din) destroyed the temples of the idolaters and erected pulpits and arches for mosques” (ibid).

3. Somanath: “They made the temple prostrate itself towards the Kaaba. You may say that the temple first offered its prayers and then had a bath (i.e. the temple was made to topple and fall into the sea)…He (Ulugh Khan) destroyed all the idols and temples, but sent one idol, the biggest of all idols, to the court of his Godlike Majesty and on that account in that ancient stronghold of idolatry, the summons to prayers (Azzan)was proclaimed so loudly that they heard it in Misr (Egypt) and Madain (Iraq)” (Tarikh-i-Alai).

4. Delhi: “He (Ala-ud-Din) ordered the circumference of the new minar to be made double of the old one (Qutub Minar)… The stones were dug out from the hills and the temples of the infidels were demolished to furnish a supply” (Ibid).

5. Ranthambhor: “This strong fort was taken by the slaughter of the stinking Rai. Jhain was also captured, an iron fort, an ancient abode of idolatry, and a new city of the people of the (muslim) faith arose. The temple of Bahir (Bhairava) Deo and temples of other gods, were all razed to the ground” (lbid).

6. Brahmastpuri (Chidambaram): “Here he (Malik Kafur) heard that in Brahmastpuri there was a golden idol … he then determined on razing the temple to the ground ..lt was the holy place of the Hindus which Malik dug up from its foundations with the greatest care. And the heads of Brahmans and idolaters danced from their necks and fell to the ground at their feet, and blood flowed in torrents.

The stone idols called Ling Mahadeo which had been established a long time at the place and on which the women of the infidels (Hindus) rubbed their vaginas for (sexual) satisfaction. (Mark the extent of the derogatory tone of the Islamic Saint Amir Khusro – Author). These, up to this time, the kick of the horse of Islam had not attempted to break. The Musalmans destroyed all the lingas, and Deo Narain fell down.

The Kutub Minar built by Kutub-ud-din Aibak. The Kutub Minar is one of the earliest Islamic monuments in India. This Minar was built from the columns of destroyed Hindu and Jain temples. It stands at the site of Pithoragarh which was the capital of Prithiviraj Chauhan, the last Hindu ruler of Delhi.The damaged motifs in this picture show clear Hindu origins – a testimony to the vandalism of the Muslim aggressors. There are many such temples which had been converted into mosques like the Bhoja Shala Mosque, the Gyan Vyapi Mosque, the Krishna Janmabhoomi Idgah, apart from the now liberated Ramjanmabhoomi at Ayodhya. The total runs to 3000 (Three Thousand).  In the opinion of the author, all such controversial structures should be taken possession of by a national educational trust and be converted into schools for humanist and rationalist education. This could be the first step in the long journey for converting all places of religious worship all over the globe into schools for humanist and rationalist education where humans can finally be taught the futility of worshipping human ignorance termed as God and the stupidity of fighting each other due to the different names we have given to human ignorance.

For related graphic, visit the site:

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What Hiuen Tsang had seen in pre-Islamic India

Some historians say that the Hindu temples in North India had been destroyed not by the Muslim invaders but by the White Huns who had invaded India in the 5th century, i.e. 500 years before the first Muslims set their foot in north India in the 10th century.

Hiuen Tsang, a Buddhist pilgrim, who came from China, after the invasion of the White Huns, found many monasteries in pre-Islamic India. He said they were in a splendid state. In his days the White Huns had invaded north India and had even established their rule over Kashmir where Hiuen Tsang saw 500 monasteries housing 5,000 monks It is, therefore, difficult to hold them responsible for the disappearance of Buddhist centres in areas where Hiuen Tsang had found them flourishing.

An explanation has to be found elsewhere. In any case, the upheaval the White Huns caused was over by the middle of the sixth century. Moreover, the temples and monasteries which Hiuen Tsang saw were only a few out of many. He had not gone into the interior of any province, having confined himself to the more famous Buddhist centres.

What Really Happened to Hindu Temples

So what was it that really happened to thousands upon thousands of temples and monasteries? Why did they disappear and/or give place to another type of monuments? How come that their architectural and sculptural fragments got built into the foundations, doors, walls and domes of the Islamic edifices which replaced them? These are crucial questions which should have been asked by students of medieval Indian history.

But no historian worth his name has raised these questions squarely, not to speak of finding accurate answers to them. No systematic study of the subject has been made. What we have is stray references to the demolition of a few Hindu temples, made by the more daring Hindu historians while discussing the religious policies of this or that sultan.

Sir Jadunath Sarkar and Professor Sri Ram Sharma have given more attention to the Islamic policy of demolishing Hindu temples and pointed an accusing finger at the theological tenets which dictated that policy. But their treatment of the subject is brief and their enumeration of temples destroyed by Aurangzeb and the other Mughal emperors touches only the fringe of a vast holocaust caused by the Theology of Islam all over the cradle of Hindu Culture and throughout more than thirteen hundred years of Muslim occupation of India.

What the Muslim Historians have to Say

Muslim historians, in India and abroad, have written hundreds of accounts in which the progress of Islamic armies across the cradle of Hindu culture is narrated, stage by stage and period by period.

A pronounced feature of these Muslim histories is a description – in smaller or greater detail but always with considerable pride – of how the Hindus were slaughtered en masse or converted by force, how hundreds of thousands of Hindu men and women and children were captured as booty and sold into slavery, how Hindu temples and monasteries were razed to the ground or burnt down, and how images of Hindu Gods and Goddesses were destroyed or desecrated.

Islamic Iconoclasm Today

A gigantic image of the Great Master – Buddha
at Bamiyan near Kabul in Afghanistan.
It is this image which has been threatened to be blown up by the Taliban, the Islamic militia that rules Afghanistan.  The statue faced its first defilement at the hands of Islamic invaders when they invaded pre-dominantly Buddhist Afghanistan in the 8th century
Incidentally the name Afghanistan is derived from the Sanskrit terms Upa-gana-stan  which means “Lands where the Allied tribes live”.

Commandments of Allah (Quran) and precedents set by the Prophet (Sunnah) are frequently cited by the authors in support of what the swordsmen and demolition squads of Islam did with extraordinary zeal, not only in the midst of war but also, and more thoroughly, after Islamic rule had been firmly established. Islamic Theology supports the Destruction of ALL Non-Muslim Places of Worship

A reference to the Quran and to the Theology of Islam as perfected by the orthodox Imams, leaves little doubt about the violent and aggressive nature of Islam.

Jihad is Allah’s command to the Muslims to destroy the non- Muslims. It is not at all necessary that the non-Muslims need have wronged the Muslims, for them to be attacked by the Muslims. The “crime” that the non-Muslims do not believe in Islam is enough for the Muslims to attack the non-Muslims. Here is what the Quran says:

“I have been commanded by Allah to fight the unbelievers until they believe in Allah and His prophet and follow the laws of Islam. It is only then that the safety of their lives and property may be guaranteed.” (Sahih Tirmzi, Vol. 2: 192)

And why should they persecute and annihilate the non-Muslims? The Koran explains the point:

“God has bought from the believers their selves and their possessions against the gift of paradise; they fight in the way of God; they kill, and are killed; that is a promise; binding on God…. And who fulfills his covenant truer than God? So rejoice in the bargain you have made with Him that is the mighty triumph…” (Repentance: 192)

Jihad, as can be seen, is a covenant between Allah and the Muslims; the former offers paradise to the latter for killing and plundering the non-Muslims without having any moral qualm in return for Paradise. Obviously, according to Islamic theology the massacre of the fellow-beings and the plunder of their possession is an act of great righteousness because it attracts the highest reward – that is, paradise. The Quran justifies booty, the plunder of the infidels in the following words:

“It is not for any prophet to have prisoners, until he make wide slaughter in land…..

Eat of what you have taken as booty, it is lawful and good.” (The Spoils: 65)

Here is the essence of Islamic Jihad: Invade the non-Muslims in the name of Allah for the sheer crime of not believing in Him; first carry out an extensive carnage of the people then all their property including women and children become legally and morally the possessions of the Muslims, who are at liberty to use them as they think fit.

The Physical Evidence – Mutilated Hindu Architecture

The apologists for Islam – the most clogged among them are some Pseudo-secularist historians and politicians – have easily got away with the plea that Muslim court scribes having succumbed to poetic exaggeration in order to please their pious patrons. Their case is weakened when they cite the same sources in support of their speculations or when the question is asked as to why the patron needed stories of bloodshed and wanton destruction for feeding their piety.

There are, however witnesses who are not beyond recall who can confirm that the Muslim court scribes were not at all foisting fables on their readers. These are the hundreds of thousands of sculptural and architectural fragments which stand arrayed in museums and drawing rooms all over the world, or which are awaiting to be picked up by public and private collectors, or which stare at us from numerous Muslim monuments.

These are the thousands of Hindu temples and monasteries which either stand on the surface in a state of ruination or lie buried under the earth waiting for being brought to light by the archaeologist’s spade. These are the thousands of Muslim edifices, religious as well as secular, which occupy the sites of Hindu temples and monasteries and/or which have been constructed from materials of those monuments. All these witnesses carry unimpeachable evidence of the violence that was done to them, deliberately and by malevolent hands.

The Silence of Art Historians regarding the mutilation of Hindu Art, Architecture and Sculpture

So far no one has cared to make these witnesses speak and relate the story of how they got ruined, demolished, dislocated, dismembered, defaced mutilated and burnt. Recent writers on Hindu architecture and sculpture – their tribe is multiplying fast, mostly ffor commercial reasons – ignore the ghastly wounds which these witnesses show at the very first sight, and dwell on the beauties of the limbs that have survived or escaped injury.

Many a time they have to resort to their imagination for supplying what should have been there but is missing. All they seem to care for is building their own reputations as historians of Hindu art. If one draws their attention to the mutilations and disfigurements suffered by the subjects under study, one is met with a stunned silence or denounced downright as a Hindu chauvinist out to raise ‘demons from the past with the deliberate intention of causing communal strife. I, therefore, propose to present only one case out the innumerable of these in order to show in what shape such monuments are and what tale of vandalism they have to tell.

Hindu Monuments of Pre-Islamic Delhi

Archaeological excavations during 1992-95 at Lalkot, a Tomar citadel near Mehrauli before Delhi was occupied by Muhammad Ghori in 1192, have uncovered the following:
– Antiquities in the levels of Period II (Early Sultanate). A number of sculptural and architectural fragments in stone of the Rajput period have been noticed scattered on the surface or found in the levels of Period II, either in the deposits or reused in construction of early Sultanate structures.

They included a Varaha head; amalakas; adhisthana mouldings; pillar bases; parts of sculptured door jambs, one with maithuna figures; moulded and decorated architectural fragments; small sculptures showing Tirthankara, deities, vase etc.; Nandi figure and a lion’s head which can be connected with the story of stone lion figures at the gate of the palaces of Anang Pal II.

The evidence of stone Nandi suggests for the first time the existence of a Shiva temple in the vicinity. The pre-Muslim association of this structural period of early Sultanate age is evidenced by a number of scattered or reused architectural and sculptural stone fragments. Among them the hind part of a figure of Nandi, the Vahana of Lord Shiva, reused in the foundation of wall as a rubble.

India in the Eyes of Pseudo Secular Historians of Our Times

Their interpretation of Indian history recognizes only the economic reality. And although economic reality is an important element of human existence. It is not the only one. Issues like Religious Fanaticism, exist independent of economic factors. These Historians view the Muslim invasions of India purely as raids of bandits out who came to loot the material wealth of India. To loot the temples of Somnath, Thanesar, Mathura, Kanauj, etc. Yes the Muslim invaders did loot the country’s material wealth. But they also destroyed the Nalanda University, and burned down the countless treatises that were stored there. The Muslim invaders converted millions of Hindus to Islam at the point of the Sword, they also massacred millions more and had a practice of making a tower of severed enemy (Hindu) heads in the main square of a town after its conquest. They abducted many Hindu women and held them as concubines in Harems.

This list of crimes against humanity on part of the medieval Muslim invaders could be endless. Now these crimes do not have any economic angle at all. But all the same they were committed and they reflect in clear terms a barbaric and backward attitude. About this there is no doubt. The Pseudo Secular Historians try to mask this reality. And in this they are guilt of hiding facts and distorting history. They write that Mahmud Ghaznavi only destroyed temples to plunder their wealth, not for religious motives: a theory in flagrant contradiction with all the contemporary evidence. Mahmud was a devout Muslim, who copied the Quran “for the benefit of his soul”. He refused the huge ransom which the Hindus offered in return for an idol which he had captured, since he preferred to be an idol breaker rather than an idol-seller”. He destroyed many non-wealthy Hindu temples and left wealthy mosques untouched. He wasted time in non-profit acts of desecration, like hanging a cow’s tongue around an idol’s neck. On such facts, no honest historian would have built the conclusion that Mahmud was led by economical rather that fanatical religious motives.

What Really Happened in India during the Muslim Invasions?

Invaders at a very low level of civilisation and culture worth the name, from Arabia and west Asia, began entering India from the early eighth century onwards. Islamic invaders demolished countless Hindu temples, shattered uncountable sculptures and idols, plundered innumerable palaces and forts of Hindu kings, killed vast numbers of Hindu men and carried off Hindu women. This story, the educated Indians – and a lot of even the illiterate Indians – know very well. Indian History books at School and College do not tell the story in its true detail. Hence many Indians do not seem to recognize that the alien Muslim marauders destroyed the historical evolution of what was a spiritually, philosophically and materially advanced civilisation.

Pre-Islamic Hindu civilization was the most richly imaginative culture, and the most vigorously creative society.

The damaged armless image of the bodyguard of Shiva-Maheshwara as depicted at the Hoysaleshwara Temple complex at Halebid.  Hindu temples built in the ancient times were perfect works of art. The evidence of the ferocity with which the Muslim invaders must have struck at the sculptures of gods and goddesses, and apsaras, kings and queens, dancers and musicians is frightful. At so many ancient temples of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, for example, shattered portions of stone images still lie scattered in the temple courtyards.  Considering the fury used on the idols and sculptures, the stone- breaking axe must have been applied to thousands upon thousands of images of hypnotic beauty. Giving proof of the resentment that men belonging to an inferior civilisation feel upon encountering a superior civilisation of individuals with a more refined culture.

For related graphic, visit the site:
http://members.tripod.com/~sudheerb/holocaust1.html

It is clear that India at the time when Muslim invaders turned towards it (8th to 11th century) was a rich region for its religion and culture: and its fine arts and letters and even for its wealth in terms of material sciences, art and architecture, precious and semi-precious stones, gold and silver.

Tenth century India was also too far advanced than its contemporaries in the East and the West for its achievements in the realms of speculative philosophy and scientific theorizing, mathematics and knowledge of nature’s workings. Hindus of the early medieval period were unquestionably superior in more things than the Chinese, the Persians (including the Sassanians), the Romans and the Byzantines of the immediate preceding centuries.

The Finesse of pre-Islamic Hindu Art and Architecture

Medieval India until the Islamic invaders destroyed it, was history’s most richly imaginative culture and one of the world’s most advanced civilisations of those times. Look at the Hindu art that Muslim iconoclasts severely damaged or destroyed. Ancient Hindu sculpture is vigorous and sensual in the highest degree-more fascinating than any other figural art created anywhere else on earth. (Only statues created by classical Greek artists are in the same class as Hindu temple sculpture.)

Ancient Hindu temple architecture is the most awe-inspiring, ornate and spell-binding architectural style. (The Gothic art of cathedrals in Western Europe is the only other religious architecture that is comparable with the intricate architecture of ancient Hindu temples such as those at Khajuraho, Madurai, Dwarka, Kanchipuram,etc.) No artists of any historical civilisation have ever revealed the same genius as ancient India’s artists and artisans.

The Devastation caused by Islamic Iconoclasm

Their minds filled with venom against the idol-worship and the idol-worshippers of India, the Muslims destroyed any Hindu temple that came their way. This is a historical fact, mentioned by Muslim chroniclers and others of the time. When the Muslims faced Hindu resistance and were forced to retreat they merely damaged the Hindu temples they could lay their hands on but the temples remained standing. This is what happened in South India.

But a large number – not hundreds but many thousands – of the ancient Hindu temples in North India were broken into shards of cracked stone. In the ancient cities of Varanasi and Mathura, Ujjain and Maheshwar, Jwalamukhi and Dwaraka, not one temple survives whole and intact from the ancient times. The wrecking of Hindu temples went on from the early years of the 8th century to well past 1700 AD, a period of almost 1000 years. Every Muslim ruler in Delhi (or Governor of Provinces) spent most of his time warring against Hindu kings in the north and the south, the east and the west: and almost every Muslim Sultan and his army commanders indulged in large-scale destructions of Hindu temples and idols.

It is easy to conclude that virtually every Hindu temple built in the ancient times is a perfect work of art. The evidence of the ferocity with which the Muslim invaders must have struck at the sculptures of gods and goddesses, and apsaras, kings and queens, dancers and musicians is frightful. At so many ancient temples of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, for example, shattered portions of stone images still lie scattered in the temple courtyards.

Considering the fury used on the idols and sculptures, the stone-breaking axe must have been applied to thousands upon thousands of images of hypnotic beauty. Giving proof of the resentment that men belonging to an inferior civilisation feel upon encountering a superior civilisation of individuals with a more refined culture,

Islamic invaders from Arabia and western Asia broke and burned everything beautiful they came across in India. So morally degenerate were the Muslim Sultans that, rather than attract Hindu “infidels” to Islam through force of personal example and exhortation, they just built a number of mosques at the sites of torn down temples – and foolishly pretended that they had triumphed over the minds and culture of the Hindus. I have seen stones and columns of Hindu temples incorporated into the architecture of several mosque, including the Jama Masjid and Ahmed Shah Masjid in Ahmedabad; the mosque in the Uparkot fort of
Junagadh (Gujarat) and in Vidisha (near Bhopal); the Adhai Din Ka Jhonpra right next to the famous dargah in Ajmer-and the currently controversial Bhojshala “mosque” in Dhar (near Indore).

Hindu culture was at its imaginative best and vigorously creative when the severely-allergic-to-images Muslims entered India. Islamic invaders did not just destroy countless temples and constructions but also suppressed cultural and religious practices; damaged the pristine vigour of Hindu culture; prevented the intensification of Hindu culture, debilitating it permanently; stopped the development of Hindu arts: ended the creative impulse in all realms of thought and action; damaged the people’s cultural pride, disrupted the transmission of values and wisdom, cultural practices and tradition from one generation to the next; destroyed the proper historical evolution of Hindu kingdoms and society; affected the acquisition of knowledge, research and reflection and violated the moral basis of Hindu society.

Slaughter of the Civilian Hindu Population

The Muslim Swordsmen also slaughtered a lot of Hindus civilians away from the battlefield. This was something that the Hindus were not used to. Although pre-Islamic India was not exactly a zone of peace, and there used to be warfare, but there was also a code of warfare too.

War took place from Sunrise up to Sunset

Warfare under the shadow of darkness was considered foul

In the battlefield, an adversary who laid down his arms was not to be slaughtered.

No civilian population was ever killed.

This code of warfare was followed by the Hindus right up to the Muslim invasions, and this was one reason for the successive Hindu defeats at the hands of the Muslims who had no qualms for foul means during warfare and even in peace times.

Needless to add that the Muslim invaders converted millions of Hindus to Islam at the point of the Sword, they also massacred millions more and had a practice of making a tower of severed enemy (Hindu) heads in the main square of a town after its conquest. They abducted many Hindu women and held them as concubines in Harems.

Most Muslim rulers were fanatical proselytizers of their religion. Under the rulership of Delhi Sultans the public worship at Hindu temples was generally forbidden, Hindus were not allowed to build new temples or repair old ones. Some rulers like Allah-ud-din Khilji and Feroz Shah Tughlak would desecrate temples upon the conquest of new territory as a symbol of victory of Islam. One some occasions a particularly fanatical Muslim king like Sikander Lodi would in a fit of paranoia desecrate or destroy temples even in peaceful times.

“In 1669 Aurangzeb issued a general order for the destruction of Hindu temples.” As per rough estimates about 3000 (Three Thousand) temples were destroyed and converted into Mosques in the 750 years of Muslim rule in India. But let bygones be bygones. The fact is mentioned here only to set the record straight. In my personal view all such controversial structures should be taken possession of by an educational trust and be converted into schools to preach the unity of Humankind. And eventually not just such controversial structures, but all places of religious worship should cease to be prayer houses and should be used to house schools for humanist and rationalist education. (This obviously is the author’s personal view)

“During the sultanate and later under Aurangzeb, many hundreds of thousands of Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam. Shah Jahan appointed a superintendent of converts charged with the special responsibility for making converts. The sentences of criminals and prisoners of war were readily remitted and the individuals were granted daily allowances upon embracing Islam. The conversion of Muslims to Hinduism, on the other hand, constituted the crime of apostasy and was punished by death. The Jaziya, a special tax levied on all non-Muslims, was both a heavy financial -burden and a badge of inferiority borne by the Hindu; it also stimulated conversions to Islam.

The Quww’at-ul-Islam Mosque (Power of Islam).
This Mosque which stands in the Kutub Minar complex was built by Kutub-ud-din Aibak, the first Muslim ruler of Delhi. The Quww’at-ul-Islam Mosque (Power of Islam) is the first mosque erected in India by Muslim invaders after the Islamic aggression of India. This Mosque was built with the columns from destroyed Hindu and Jain temples. It stands at the site of Pithoragarh which was the capital of Prithiviraj Chauhan the last Hindu ruler of Delhi.

For related graphic, visit the site:
http://members.tripod.com/~sudheerb/holocaust1.html

Thus, during the 7 centuries of Mohammedan rule a significant portion of our countrymen had to change their religion by force of circumstances. And in 4 erstwhile Indian Provinces viz. West Punjab, Sindh, East Bengal and NWFP the Muslim converts came to constitute a majority by the present century. The multi-religious character of India is largely an ugly litter of intolerance, persecution, penal taxes, conversion of faith at the point of the sword, discriminatory civil and criminal laws, defilement and conversion of places of worship from that of one faith to another, all of which the country witnessed during the seven centuries of Muslim rule.

The Psychological Damage to the Hindu Mind

The Hindus suffered immense psychic damage. The Muslims also plundered the wealth of the Hindu kingdoms, impoverished the Hindu populace, and destroyed thc prosperity of India. The Psychological damage to the Hindu Mind, due to Muslim rule, was immense and unmeasurable.

Today after a gap of one thousand years, the innate spirit of humanness that is the basis of Hindu Culture can again breathe freely and it is about time that we recollect it and the successes it propelled the human mind to achieve. The human mind embodied in the ancient sages, rishis, munis and sanyasis – scientists in modern parlance.

We need to remember our past clearly and vividly, lest we forget, our capability to contribute to the repository of human knowledge, lest we forget our capability to activate the indomitable human mind residing within us, lest we forget our humane instincts that gave us a sagacious and charitable view of life along with progress – economic, technological and material. All that which goes under the term CIVILIZATION.

The human spirit in Ancient India has given to the world, the values of non-violence, religious tolerance, renunciation alongwith many elements of knowledge in fields like production technology, mechanical engineering, shipbuilding, navigation, architecture, civil engineering, medical science, physics, chemistry, logic, astronomy, mathematics and so on.

We have to live up to this legacy that can help human beings in all corners of our globe to rejuvenate our spirit not to conquer one another, but to conquer oneself; not to destroy, but to build; not to hate, but to love; not to isolate oneself, but to integrate everyone into one global society and to achieve much more in the future to enrich human civilisation to result in: “The maximum welfare of the maximum number” or as in Sanskrit it is called: “Loko Samasto Sukhino Bhavantu” and “Samasta Janaanaam Sukhino Bhavantu.”

In the next post we shall see what Different Historians have to say about the Hindu Holocaust.

Sudheer Birodkar

The Scientific Dating of the Mahabharat War

By Dr.P.V.Vartak

————————————————————–

INTRODUCTION

The Mahabharat has excercised a continuous and pervasive influence on the Indian mind for milleniums. The Mahabharat, orginally written by Sage Ved Vyas in Sanskrut, has been translated and adapted into numerous languages and has been set to a variety of interpretations. Dating back to “remote antiquity”, it is still a living force in the life of the Indian masses.

Incidently, the dating of the Mahabharat War has been a matter of challenge and controversy for a century or two. European scholars have maintained that the events described in the ancient Sanskrut texts are imaginary and subsequently, the Mahabharat derived to be a fictitiou tale of a war fought between two rivalries. Starting from the so- called Aryan invasion into Bharat, the current Bharatiya chronology starts from the compilation of the Rigved in 1200 B.C., then come other Ved’s, Mahaveer Jain is born, then Gautam Buddha lives around 585 B.C. and the rest follows. In the meantime, the Brahmanas, Samhi- tas, Puranas, etc. are written and the thought contained therein is well-absorbed among the Hindu minds. Where does the Ramayan and Mahabharat fit in ? Some say that the Ramayan follows Mahabharat and some opine otherwise. In all this anarchy of Indian histography, the date of the Mahabharat (the mythical story!) ranges between 1000 B.C.to 300 B.C. Saunskrut epics were academically attacked occasion- ally – an attempt to disprove the authencity of the annals noted therein. For example, the European Indologiest Maxmuller, tried the interpret the astronomical evidences to prove that the observations recorded in the Hindu scriptures are imaginary, probably because it did not match the prevelant views of European historians!

On the contrary, many Bharatiya scholars have vehemently maintained the actual occurance of the Mahabharat War. Astronomical and literary evidences or clues from the Pauranic and Vaidik texts have been deci- phered to provide a conclusive date for the Mahabharat War. The fifth century mathematician, Aryabhatta, calculated the date of the Mahabharat War to be approximately 3100 B.C. from the planetary posi- tions recorded in the Mahabharat. Prof. C.V. Vaidya and Prof. Apte had derived the date to be 3101 B.C. and Shri. Kota Venkatachalam reckoned it to be 3139 B.C. However, the astronomical data used by the above, and many other, scholars contained some errors as examined by a scho- lar from Pune, Dr. P.V. Vartak. Using astronomical references and variety of other sources, Dr. Vartak has derived the date of the ini- tiation of the Mahabharat War to be 16th October 5561 B.C. This pro- posed date has been examined by a few scholars and has been verfied. This may prove to be a break-through in deciding the chronology of the events in the history of Bharat (and probably the World).

In the following few posts, I have made an attempt to provide a glance at the proofs provided by Dr. Vartak in propounding the date of the very important landmark in the history of Bharat (World?), i.e., Mahabharat War. Only major points have been extracted from two sources: Dr.P.V. Vartak’s Marathi book “Swayambhu” and “Scientific Dating of the Mahabharat War” in English.

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INSCRIPTIONS

Some scholars rely on the various inscriptions found in the temples and elsewhere to fix the date of Mahabharat War. If there is no other alternative then this method is tolerable, otherwise it is not reli- able because all the known inscriptions are dated as far back as 400 AD. Those who prepared those inscriptions were not conversant with the scientific methods available now in the modern Science Age. So, why should we depend on the conjectures of the ancient people? Why not use scientific methodology to come to the conclusion ourselves? I will prefer the use of the modern scientific ways to fix the date of Mahabharat War rather than to rely on the Inscriptions which are vague and inconclusive. Let us examine two famous inscriptions always quoted by the scholars.

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AIHOLE INSCRIPTION

All the scholars have relied on this inscription found in the Jain Temple at Aihole prepared by one Chalukya King Pulakeshi. It says, according to scholars, that the temple was constructed in 30+3000+700+5 = 3735 years, after the Bharat War and 50+6+500 = 556 years of Shaka era in Kali era. Today Shaka era is 1910. Hence 1910- 556 = 1354 years ago the temple was constructed. Thus the year of inscribing this note is 634 AD. At this time 3735 years had passed from the Bharat War. So the date of the War comes to 3101 BC. This is also the date of Kali Yuga Commencement. Naturally, it is evident that relying on the beginning of Kaliyuga Era and holding that the War took place just before the commencement of Kaliyuga, this inscription is prepared. It is obvious from the Mahabharat that the War did not happen near about the beginning of Kaliyuga. (I have considered this problem fully at a later stage.) If we can see that the inscription is prepared by relying on some false assumption, we have to neglect it because it has no value as an evidence. Moreover the interpretation done by the scholars is doubtful because they have not considered the clauses separately and they held Bharat War and Kali Era as one and the same.

The verse inscribed is :

Trinshatsu Trisahasreshu Bhaaratdahavaditaha | Saptabda Shatayukteshu Gateshwabdeshu Panchasu | Panchashatasu Kalaukale Shatasu Panchashatsu cha | Samatsu Samatitasu Shakaanamapi Bhoobhujaam ||

I would like to interprete the verse considering the clauses of the verse. It says “3030 years from the Bharat War” in the first line, ( Trinshatsu Trisahasreshu Bhaaratdahavaaditaha) where the first clause oF the sentence ends. in the second line, the second clause starts and runs upto the middle of the third line thus ( Saptabda…..Kalaukale) This means 700+5+50 = 755 years passed in the Kali Era. The remaining third clause is ( Shatasu

Here the verse does not specifically say the Shalivahan Shaka but Scholars have taken granted that it is Shalivahan Shaka without any base or reasoning. The verse may have mentioned some other Shaka kings from ancient era. So we we neglect the doubtful part of the Shaka counting which is useless and adhere to the Kali era expressly mentioned. It is clear from the former portion of the verse that 3030 years passed from the Bharat War and 755 years passed from Kali Era. Kali Era started from 3101 BC. 755 years have passed so 3101-755 = 2346 BC is the year when 3030 years had passed from the Bharat War. So 2346+3030 = 5376 BC appears to be the date of Bharat War.

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HISSE BORALA INSCRIPTION OF DEVA SENA

This inscription is of 5th century AD and scholars hold that it throws light on the time of Mahabharat War. It states. that Saptarshis were in Uttara at the time of this inscription. Scholars hold that Saptarshis were in Magha at the time of Yudhishthira because Varahmihira has stated so in Brihat-Samhita. Scholars also hold that Yudhishthira’s time is 3137 BC. Saptarshis stay in one Nakshtra for 100 years, and there are 27 Nakshatras. Hence Saptarshis would be again in Magha 2700 years later during 4th century BC. From here if we count upto 5th century AD there fall eight Nakshatras. Hence in the 5th century AD, Saptarshis should be in Anuradha and not Uttara. From Anuradha to Uttara Ashadha there is adifference of five Naksha- tras, while from Anuradha to Uttara Phalguni there is a difference of six Nakshatras. So it is quite evident that at the time of Yudhisthira Saptarshis were not in Magha as held by the scholars. Here I have shown a mistake of five to six hundreds of years. More- over, there are three ‘Uttaras’ and the inscription has not stated specifically which Uttara it denotes. Thus this source is unreliable and should be rejected.

I have considered Saptarshi Reckoning in details at a later stage on page 11. While going to examine the sources scientifically, I shall give the honour of the first place to Astronomy. One may question that how far Astronomy was advanced in those olden days? I say affir- matively that Astronomy was far advanced in the ancient times, and the ancient Indian sages had perfected the science of time measure- ment relying on Astronomy.

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GREEK RECORDS

1. “The Greek Ambassodor Magasthenis has recorded that 138 generations have passed between Krishna and Chandragupta Maurya. Many scholars have taken this evidence, but taking only 20 years per generation they fixed the date of Krishna as 2760 years before Chandragupta. But this is wrong because the record is not of ordinary people to take 20 years per generation. In the matter of general public, one says that when a son is born a new generation starts. But in the case of kings, the name is included in the list of Royal Dynasty only after his corona- tion to the throne. Hence, one cannot allot 20 years to one king. We have to find out the average per king by calculating on various Indian Dynasties. I have considered 60 kings from various dynasties and calculated the average of each king as 35 years. Here is a list of some of important kings with the no. of years ruling.

Chandragupta Mourya 330-298 B.C. 32 years.

Bindusar 298-273 B.C. 25 years.

Ashok 273-232 B.C. 41 years.

Pushyamitra Shunga 190-149 B.C. 41 years.

Chandragupta Gupta 308-330 A.D. 22 years.

Samudragupta 330-375 A.D. 45 years.

Vikramaditya 375-414 A.D. 39 years.

Kumargupta 414-455 A.D. 41 years.

Harsha 606-647 A.D. 41 years.

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327 years.

The average is 327/9 = 36.3 years.

Multiplying 138 generations by 35 years we get 4830 years before Chan- dragupta Mourya. Adding Chandrgupta’s date 320 B.C. to 4830 we get 5150 B.C. as the date of Lord Krishna.

2. Megasthenis, according to Arian, has written that between Sandro- cotus to Dianisaum 153 generations and 6042 years passed. From this data, we get the average of 39.5 years per king. From this we can cal- culate 5451 years for 138 generations. So Krishna must have been around 5771 B.C.

3. Pliny gives 154 generations and 6451 years between Bacchus and Alexander. This Bacchus may be the famous Bakasura who was killed by Bhimasena. This period comes to about 6771 years B.C.

Thus Mahabharat period ranges from 5000 B.C. to 6000 B.C.

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SHRIMAD BHAGWAT

a) Bhagwat gives 28 Kaurava kings from Parikshit to Kshemaka. “From Kshemaka, the Pandava Dynasty will end in Kaliyug, and Magadha Dynasty will start.” [Bhagwad 9-22-45]. This implies that the Pandava kings ruled before the advent of Kaliyug, i.e., before 3101 B.C and Magadha dynasty will not super-impose the Pandava Dynasty.

b) Further it is stated in Bhagwat that after 28 Kaurava kings, Magadha Dynasty would rule and 22 Magadha kings would govern for 1000 years. Here it is given a average of 1000 years for 22 kings. It can be found that the 28 Kaurava kings would have ruled for 1273 years and then Magadha Dynasty started with King Sahadeva, whose son was Somapi. On the other hand, Maghasandhi was the son of Sahadeva and the grand- son of Jarasandha [Ashwamedh-82]. many scholars have neglected this fact and have assumed that this Sahadeva fought in the Mahabharat War and was the son of Jarasandha.

c) Ripunjaya is the last king in the list of 22 Magadhas . But Bhagwat 12.1.2-4 mentions that Puranjaya will be the last king who will be killed by his minister Shunak. It is to be noted that there is no men- tion of the kings between Ripunjaya and Puranjaya. People have wrongly taken the two names as that of one and the same person, without any evidence.

d) Bhagwat 12.1.2-4 state that Shunak would coronate his son Pradyota as the King and later five Kings would rule for 138 years. After this Pradotya Dynasty, Shishunga Kings, 10 in number, would rule for 360 years. Thereafter 9 Nandas would rule for 100 years. Nanda would be destroyed by a Brahmin and Chandragupta would be enthroned. We know that Chandragupta Maurya ascended the throne in 324 B.C. So we can thus calculate backwards:

9 Nandas 100 years

10 Shishungas 360 years

5 Pradotyas 138 years

22 Magadhas 1000 years

28 Kauravas 1273 years

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74 Kings 2871 years

We find here only 74 kings, but Megasthenes tells us about 138 kings. So 138-74=64 kings are missing. These may be from the period between Ripunjaya and Puranjaya. Thus calculating from the data of 74 kings who ruled for 2871 years, we get a period of 2496 years for 64 kings. Adding the two we get 5367 years for 138 kings. This is preceding Chandragupta’s time, who came to throne in 324 B.C. Hence, 324+5367 = 5691 B.C. is the approximate date of Parikshit.

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YUDHISHTIRA ERA AND KALIYUG

Scholars accept the date of the Mahabharat War to be 3100 B.C. which also happens to the initiation of the Yudhisthira Era. But this Era, is mentioned nowhere in the Mahabharat text itself! At the time of Aswamedha of Yudhisthira, Vyas has given descriptions in minute detail like collection of “Sruva”, formation of wells and lakes, but never has written even a word about, such an important event, as the begin- ning of the Yudhisthira Era.

Mahabharat also never mentions anything about the beginning of the Kaliyug, even at the time of Krishna ‘s death. Mahabharat Adiparva 2.13 states that the War took place in the interphase (“Antare”) of the Dwapaar and Kali Eras. Thus it makes it clear that the evening of the Dwapaar has not yet ended and the Kaliyug had not started when the War took place.

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SAPTARISHIS

Bhagwat states at 12.2.27-32 that Saptarishis stay 100 years in one Nakshatra. At the time of King Parikshit, the Saptarishis were in Magha. When they proceeded to Purvashadha, Kali would start. There are 11 Nakshatras from Magha to Purvashadha. Hence it is seen that Shukacharya tells Parikshit that after 1100 years Kaliyug will start. Kaliyug started at 3101 B.C. Hence 3101 + 1100 = 4201 B.C. is the date of Parikshit.

Other references from Shrimad Bhagwat points quite closely to the same year as above.

But who is this Parikshit ? Is he the son of Abhimanyu ? No. A minute observation of this reveals that the above is not Abhimanyu’s son because Bhagwat is told to this Parikshit. On the other hand, Mahabharat is told to Janamejaya. In the Mahabharat, Parikshit’s death has been recorded. Hence it is evident that Mahabharat was written and published after the death of Parikshit, the son of Abhimanyu. Bhagwat is written after Mahabharat according to the Bhagawat itself. This Bhagwat is told to some Parikshit. How can this Parikshit be the son of Abhimanyu who died before the Mahabharat writing ? So this Parikshit appears to be somebody else than Abhimanyu’s son.

( this i do not accept. Parikshat, mentioned here is the grandson of Arjuna. But that will not take away the credibility of other findings.)

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EQUINOX

Mahabharat mentions the ancient tradition as ‘Shravanadini Nakshatrani’,i.e., Shravan Nakshatra was given the first place in the Nakshatra- cycle (Adi-71/34 and Ashvamedh 44/2) Vishwamitra started counting the Nakshatras from Shravan when.he created ‘Prati Srushti’. He was angry with the old customs. So he started some new customs. Before Vishvamitra’s time Nakshatras were counted from the one which was occupied by the sun on the Vernal Equinox. Vishvamitra changed this fashion and used diagonally opposite point i.e. Autumnal Equinox to list the Nakshtras. He gave first place to Shravan which was at the Autumnal Equinox then. The period of Shravan Nakshatra on autumnal equinox is from 6920 to 7880 years B.C. This was Vishvamitra’s period at the end of Treta yuga. Mahabharat War took place at the end of Dwapar yuga. Subtracting the span of Dwapar Yuga of 2400 years we get 7880 – 2400 = 5480 B.C. as the date of Mahabharat War.

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ASTROLOGY

Some scholars rely on the horoscope of Lord Krishna to calculate his birth-date so as to establish the period of Mahabharat. But they do not realise that the horoscope is a forged one, prepared many thousand years after Krishna ‘s death. Mahabharat Bhagvat and Vishnu purana have not given the planet positions at the time of Krishna ‘s birth. It is well-known and is recorded in many scriptures that Krishna was born in a jail, then who could have casted his horoscope? Moreover Krishna was not a prince so nobody would have casted his horoscope. Hence it is not wise to rely on the horoscope. It is prepared recently by consid- ering the charateristics of Krishna and so is useless to fix the birth-date.

Mr. G.S. Sampath Iyengar and Mr. G.S. Sheshagiri have fixed the birth-date of Krishna as 27th July 3112 BC. ‘The horoscope shows Lagna and Moon 52 deg. 15′ Rohini, Jupiter 91 deg. 16′ Punarvasu, Sun 148 deg. 15′ Uttara Phalguni, Mercury 172 deg. 35′ Hasta, Venus 180 deg. 15′ Chitra, Saturn 209 deg. .57′ Vishakha, Mars 270 deg. 1′ Uttara Ashadha Rahu, 160 deg. 1’.

At present on 27th July 1979 the Sun was at 99 deg. 57′, while at Krishna ‘s birth, according to their opinion, the sun was at 148 deg. 15′. The difference is 48 deg. 18′. This shows that the Sun has receded back by 48 deg. 18′ due to the precession at the rate of 72 years per degree. multiplying 48 deg. 18′ by 72 we get 3456 years. This shows that Krishna was born 3456 years ago or substracting 1979 from it we can say that Krishna was born during 1477 BC. Thus 3112 BC is found to be wrong. We cannot accept such a wrong date derived from a manipulated borscope. (This horoscope is printed in “The Age of Bharat War” on page 241-Publisher, Motilal Banarasidas 1979).

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ARCHEAOLOGY

In 1971, when I hinted at the date of Mahabharat war as 5500 years BC, Archeaologists frowned at me saying it as impossible because no cul- ture was found in India dating so much back. But now evidences are pouring in Archeaology itself showing cultures in India upto 30000 to 40000 years BC. Padmashri Late Mr. V.S. Wakankar has dated the paint- ings in the caves of Bhimbetaka of Madhya Pradesh to about 40000 BC.

Recently Dr. S.B. Rao, Emeritus Scientist of the National Institute of Oceanography, Dona Paula, Goa , 403004, has discovered under the sea, Dwaraka and dated it as between 5000 to 6000 BC. This news has been published by all the leading newspapers on 22th October 1988.

Motilal Banarasidas News Letter October 1988 gives a news on page 6 under the heading “50,000 year old Relics” as follows:

Spectacular culture and physical relics dating back to 50,000 years BC have been excavated from the Central Narmada Valley in Madhya Pradesh. A team of Anthropological survey of India recently con- ducted the excavation. It explored sites in two districts Sebore and Hoshangabad.

In my book “Vastava Ramayan” I have shown the presence of culture in India as far back as 72000 years B.C. This recent news points to that ancient period. I am sure after some time Arecheaology may get evi- dence to show the presence of culture in India 72000 BC.

In Vastava Ramayan I have shown that Bali , the demon king went to south America during 17000 BC when the vernal equinox was at Moola Nakshatra. MLBD News letter Oct. 1988 gives a news thus :-“Dravidians in America ” – According to a press report the Brazillian nuclear phy- sicist and researcher Arysio Nunes dos santos holds that the Dravi- dians of South India reached America much before Christopher Columbus.

Mr. Nunes dos Santos, of the’ Federal University of Minas Gerais maintains that the Dravidians colonised a vast South American region 11000 years before the Europians reached the new world. Vestiges of the Dravidian presence in America , he says, include the strange phonetics of Gourani , Paraguay ‘s national language. Moreover Bananas, Pine Apple, Cocunut and Cotton, all grown in India could have been taken to America by those navigators.

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THE EXACT DATE OF MAHABHARAT WAR

16TH OCTOBER 5561 YEAR B.C.

Harivansh (Vishnu Purana A. 5) states that when Nanda carried Krishna to Gokul on Shravan Vadya Navami day, there was dry cow-dung spread all over the ground and trees were cut down. The presence of Dry Cowdung all over in Gokul indicates the presence of Summer in the month of Shravan. Trees are usually cut down in Summer to be used as fuel in the rainy season. The seasons move one month backwards in two thousand years. Today the rainy season starts in Jeshtha but two thousand years ago, at the time of KaIidas, rainy season used to start in Ashadha. At the time of Krishna ‘s birth the Summer was in the month of Shravan while today it is in Vaishakha. Thus the summer is shifted by four months, hence Krishna ‘s period comes to 4×2000 = 8000 years ago approximately. This means about 6000 years B.C., the same period we have seen above.

At the time of Mahabharat, the Vernal Equinox was at Punarvasu. Next to Punarvasu is Pushya Nakshtra. Vyas used “Pushyadi Ganana” for his Sayan method, and called Nirayan Pushya as Sayan Ashvini. He shifted the names of further Sayan Nakshtras accordingly. At that time Winter Solstice was on Revati, so Vyas gave the next Nakshatra Ashvini the first palee in the Nirayan list of Nakshatras. Thus he used Ashvinyadi Ganana for the Nirayan method. Using at times Sayan names and at times Nirayan names of the Nakshatras, Vyas prepared the riddles. By the clue that Nirayan Pushya means Sayan Ashvini, it is seen that Nirayan names of Nakshatras are eight Nakshatras ahead of the Sayan names Thus the Saturn in Nirayan Purva, and Sayan Rohini, Jupiter was in Nirayan Shravan, and Sayan Swati (near Vishakha), while the Mars was in Nirayan Anuradha, and Sayan Magha, Rahu was between Chitra and Swati, by Sayan way means it was in Nirayana. Uttara Ashadha (8 Nakshtras ahead). From these positions of the major planets we can calculated the exact date. My procedure is as follows:

I found out that on 5th May 1950, the Saturn was in Purva Phalguni. From 1950 I deducted 29.45 years to get the year 1920 when the Saturn was again in Purva. In this way I prepared a vertical column of the years when the Saturn was in Purva. Similarly, I prepared vertical columns of the years when the Jupiter was in Shravan and Rahu in Uttara Ashadha. Then I searched in horizontally to find out the year common in all the three columns. It was 5561-62 B.C. when all the three great planets were at the required places. Then I proceded for the detailed calculations.

Bhisma expired at the onset of Uttarayan i.e. on 22nd December. This is a fixed point according to the modern Scientific Calendar. He was on the arrow-bed for 58 nights and he had fought for ten days. Hence 68 days earlier than 22nd December the War had started. This shows that the War started on 16th October. We have to calculate the plane- tary positions of 16th October 5561 B.C.

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SATURN

Encyclopedia of Astronomy by Larousse states that one rotation of Saturn takes 26 years and 166 days. One year means 365.25 days. So the Saturn’s round takes 29.4544832 years.

5th May 1950, Saturn conjugated with Purva. We have to see its posi- tion in 5561 years B.C. 5561+1950 = 7511 years. 7511 divided by 29.4544832 gives 255.00362 rounds. This means that Saturn completed 255 rounds and has gone ahead by 0.00362 or 1.3 degrees. Hence Saturn was in conjugation with Purva on 5th May 5561 B.C. On 16th October’ 5562nd B.C. i.e. 164 days later it must have travelled (0.0334597 degrees (daily pace) multiplied by 164 days =) 5.487 degrees. So Saturn was at 141 degrees or in Purva Nakshatra.

In October 1962, Saturn was at 281 dgrs. 1962 + 5561 = 7523 years. 7523 devided by 29.4544832 gives 255.41103 turns. After completing 255 full turns, Saturn has gone back by 0.411003 turn i.e. 148 dgrs. 281-148= 133 degrs. This was the position of Saturn in Purva.

Calculating from 1931 or 1989 also Saturn appears at 141 dgrs. in Purva. Thus on 16th of October 5562nd B.C. Saturn was in Purva as told by Vyas in Mahabharat.

RAHU

Rahu takes 18.5992 years per rotation. It was at 132 dgrs. on 16th Oct. 1979. 1979 + 5561 = 7540, divided by 18.5992 gives 405.39378 turns. 0.39378 turns means 141.7 dgrs. Rahu always goes in reverse direction. We have to go in the past, so adding 141.7 to orginal 132 we get 273 dgrs. This is Uttarashadha where Rahu was situated (by Nirayan method).

Calculations from 1989, 1962 and 1893 confirm Rahu in Uttara Ashadha.

JUPITER

Jupiter takes 11.863013 years per rotation. On 16th October 1979, it was at 129 dgrs. 1979+5561 = 7540. 7540 divided by 1.863013 gives 635.58892 turns. 0.58892 turn means 212 dgrs. So Jupiter was 212 dgrs behind the orginal position. 129 – 212 = -83. -83 means 360 – 83 = 277 degree 277 dgrs is the position of the star of Shravan. So Jupiter was in conjugation with Shravan. The span of Shravan is 280 deg. to 293 deg.

Calculations from 1989, 1932 and 1977 show Jupiter in 285 and 281 degrees or in the zone of Shravan. This confirms the position told by Vyas.

MARS

Mars takes 1.88089 years per rotation. On 16th October 1979, Mars was at 108 dgrs. 1979 + 5561 = 7540 yrs. 7540 divided by 1.88089 gives 4008.7405 turns. 0.7405 turns means 266 dgrs., Mars was 266 dgrs behind the original position of 108 deg. 108 – 266 = 158. 360 – 158 = 202 deg. This is just beyond the star of Vishakha which is at 200 dgrs. Though in Vishakha-zone Mars has crossed the Star of Vishakha and intends to go in Anuradha, so the description of Vyas as “Anurad- ham Prarthayate” that it requests or appeals Anuradha, appears to be correct.

Calculations from 1962 and 1900 show Mars at 206 and’ 208 dgrs and therefore though in Vishakha, it can be called as appealing Anuradha “Anuradham Prarthayate”. Thus it is seen that Vyas has used tricky but correct terms. He has not written any false statement because he was the Truth-abiding Sage.

HELIOCENTRIC AND GEOCENTRIC

Here an expert may raise a question whether I have used Heliocentric method or Geocentric method. I make it clear here that I have used the Heliocentric method that means I have considered the rotations of planets around the Sun. But after fixing the position of the planet around the Sun I have also seen where that planet will be seen from the earth.

I would like the scholars to consider one more point here. When I say that an insect is sitting near one o’ clock position on your watch or clock, one may think that the insect is between 12 and 1 while other may think that it is between 1 and 2. So the span to find that insect is from 12 to 2. Similarly Vyas has mentioned the Nakshatra in the vicinity of the planet and therefore we have a scope of one Nakshatra on either side to find out the planet. Thus if our answer is between +13 deg. and -13 deg. from the given position we are successful. In my calculations I have achieved the perfect positions, but by chance, somebody gets a different position he is requested to consider a span of -,+ 13 degrees. The positions given by other scholars are far away than the positions recorded by Vyas, so they are not acceptable.

I request the scholars, to be careful while doing calculations not to take a retrograde position of the present planet, because that may give a false position. Please note that all the planets become retro- grade only apparently when our earth is approaching them. We need not consider their retrograde motion each year because their rotational periods around the Sun are fixed and in that they are seen retrograde from the earth apparently. We have to see if the last position of the planet is retrograde. This can be done easily by considering the position of the Sun and planet. Any external planet becomes retrograde when it is in the house from 5th to 9th from the Sun.

LEAP YEAR

Please note that i have taken 365.25 days for a solar year. It covers the general leap years, but it does not take into account the leap years abandoned at centuries. At the interval of 400 years leap years are taken according to the modern scientific calendar. If these cen- tury years are considered, there may be an error of 50 days in 7500 years duration. As for dates these 50 days are automatically accounted for because we have taken the winter solstice as fixed on 22nd December, and it is referred by Vyas, while describing Bhishma’s death. As far as the planets like Saturn, Rahu and Jupiter are con- cerned 50 days are immaterial because in 50 days the Saturn will move only 1.6 deg. while Jupiter 4.1 deg. as an average. Hence their error is negligible.

Now, we have seen that all the four important planets satisfy their positions as told by Vyas on 16th October 5562nd B.C. Hence we have no other way but to accept this date as the exact date of Mahabharat War.

Please note that, so far, not a single Scholar has shown a date with the planetary positions satisfying the description by Vyas in Mahabharat. Late Mr. C. V. Vaidya and Prof. Apte show 3102 B.C., but their Mars is in Ashadha, Jupiter is in Revati, Saturn in Shatataraka and Rahu in Jeshtha. Prof. K. Shrinivasraghavan, Mr. Sam- pat Ayangar and Sheshagiri show 3067 B.C. but they put Jupiter and Saturn in Rohini and Sun, Rahu, Mars in Jeshtha. Garga, Varahmihir and Tarangini show 2526 Before Shaka i.e. 2449 B.C. But their Mars comes in Dhanishtha, Jupiter and Saturn in Bharani and Rahu in Hasta. P.C. Sengupta gives 2448 with Saturn 356 deg., Jupiter 8 deg., Mars 157 deg., Venus 200 deg., Sun 200 deg., (Ancient Indian chronology” Calcutta University). The Western scholars as well as Romeshchandra Datta and S. B. Roy show 1424 B.C. but their Saturn is in Shata- taraka, Jupiter in Chitra, Rahu in Purva and Sun in Anuradha with no eclipse. Billandi Ayer shows 1193 years B.C. but his Mars comes in Mula, Jupiter in Purva Bhadrapada, Saturn in Purva Ashadha and Rahu in Punarvasu. At 900 B.C. as is proposed by many other scholars, Jupiter comes in Mula, Rahu in Vishakha and Saturn in Jeshtha. Thus not a single scholar could coroborate his date with the facts written by Vyas.Hence, their dates have to be dismissed. (C. V. Vaidya’s Upasamhar page 94.” Age of Mahabharat War”).

I have shown all the planetary positions correct to the description of Mahabharat. In addition I have shown that the seasons tally with my date, and the seasons never tally with other dates. I have solved all the planetary riddles from Mahabharat which nobody could dare. So 16th October 5562nd BC. is the exact date of the first day of the Mahabharat War. At the beginning of the War, Vyas promised Dhrutarashtra that he will write history of the Kauravas; so most probably Vyas must have written the Astronomical data immediately.

URANUS (known to Vyas in 5561 B.C)

All the planets, viz., Sun, Moon, Mars, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn and Rahu show correct positions mentioned in the Mahabharat on 16th December 5561 B.C. This must be the exact date of the Mahabharat War. After pin-pointing the exact date, it struck to me that the three additional planets mentioned with positions by Vyas, may be Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. Vyas has named them as Shveta, Shyama and Teevra. Let us see if the conjecture is correct. We have to prove this with the help of Mathematics, because we have to go scientifically.

Vishesheena hi Vaarshneya Chitraam Pidayate Grahah….[10-Udyog.143]

Shevtograhastatha Chitraam Samitikryamya Tishthati….[12-Bheeshma.3]

In these two stanzas, Vyas states that some greenish white (Shveta) planet has crossed Chitra. This means that the planet was in Swati (or Vishakha, because Chitra and Swati are close together). This is the Sayan position hence Nirayan position is eight Nakshatras ahead in Shravan (or Dhanishtha). Neelakantha calls this “Mahapata” which means having greater orbit. Greater orbit indicates a planet beyond Saturn. Hence I assumed Shveta to be Uranus. Let us calculate and see if this true.

In October 1979, Uranus was at 206 degrees. Uranus takes 84.01 years per rotation. 1979 + 5561 = 7540. 7540/84.01 = 89.75122 turns. 0.75122 rotation means 270.4392 degrees. 206-270 = -64 = 296 degrees. This comes in the zone of Dhanishtha, but the star of Dhanishtha is at 297 degrees, so the position given by Vyas is confirmed. Hence Shveta must be Uranus.

In October 1883, Uranus was at 151 degrees. 1883 + 5561 = 7444 years. 7444/84.01 = 86.608498 rotations. 0.608498 turn means 219 degrees. 151-219 = 292 degrees. This is Shravan Nakshatra. So Uranus was in Shravan during Mahabharat War as stated by Vyas under the name of “Shveta”.

1930 calculations show Uranus to be at 292.54 degrees or Shravan. Thus our mathematics proves that Vyas has given correct position of Uranus under the name of Shveta. This proves that Vyas had the knowledge of Uranus under the name of Shveta, supposed to have recently discovered by Herschel in 1781. Shveta means greenish white. Uranus is actually greenish white in colour. So Vyas must have seen Uranus with this own eyes. Uranus is of 6th magnitude and is visible to the naked eye according to the modern science.

Neelakantha of 17th century also had the knowledge of Uranus or Shveta. He writes in his commentary on Mahabharat (Udyog 143) that Shveta, or Mahapata was a famous planet in the Astronomical science of India . Neelakantha was about 100 years before Herschel, who sup- posedly discovered Uranus. So we can conclude that one hundred before Herschel, Uranus was known to the Indian Astronomers and Vyas had discovered it at or before 5561 year B.C.

NEPTUNE (was known to Vyas in 5561 B.C.)

In 1781 A.D., Herschel discovered Uranus; but its calculated positions never corroborated with the actual positions. So the experts thought of another planet beyond Uranus. They fixed its position by mathemat- ics, and at that site, it was discovered by German Astronomers in 1846 A.D. I have found that Neptune is also mentioned by Vyas in Mahabharat, under the name of “Shyama”.

Shukrahah Prosthapade Poorve Samaruhya Virochate Uttare tu Parikramya Sahitah Samudikshyate….[15-Bheeshma.3] Shyamograhah Prajwalitah Sadhooma iva Pavakah Aaindram Tejaswi Naksha- tram Jyesthaam Aakramya Tishthati…[16-Bheeshma.3]

Here Vyas says that there was some luminary with Venus in Poorva Bha- drapada. He adds further that a bluish white (Shyama) planet was in Jyeshtha and it was smoky (Sadhoom). Saayan Jyeshta means Nirayan Poorva Bhadrapada, so this is the description of one and the same planet named by Vyas as Shyama. Neelkantha calls it “Parigha” in his commentary on Mahabharat. Parigha means circumference, so this planet may be at the circumference of our solar system.; and so may be Nep- tune. Let us see by Mathematics is this statement is true. We will determine the position of Neptune on 16th December 5561 B.C.

Neptune takes 164.78 years per rotation. It was at 234 degrees in 1979. 1979 + 5561 = 7540 years. 7540 divided by 164.78 gives 45.75798 rotations. 0.75798 turn means 272.87 degrees. 234 – 272.87 = -38.87 = 321.13 degrees. This is the site of Poorva Bhadrapada. So Neptune was in Poorva-Bhadrapada during 5561 B.C.

In 1948, Neptune was at 172 degres. 1948 + 5561 = 7509. 7509/164.78 gives 45.56985 turns. 0.56985 turn means 205 degrees. 172-205 = -33 =360-33 = 327 deg. This is the zone of Poorva Bhadrapada.

In 1879, Neptune was at 20 degrees. 1879 + 5561 = 7440 years. 7440 divided by 164.78 gives 45.15111 turns. 0.15111 turn means 54.39 deg. 20 – 54.39 = -34.39 = 360 – 34.39 = 325.61 degrees. This is Poorva- Bhadrapada.

Thus the position of Shyama or Parigha is factually proved in the case of Neptune . Thus, we conclude that Vyas did know Neptune too. Vyas might have got his knowledge by Yogic Power or by Mathematics or by using telescopic lenses. Mathematics was far advanced then, that is why ancient Indian sages fixed the rate of precession of Equinoxes accurately. Even the world famous scientist Gamov praised the sages for their remarkable work in Mathematics. So could have mathematically calculated the position of Shyama or Neptune.

Mirrors are mentioned in the Mahabharat. So lenses too might have been present at that time. They had Microscopic Vision (Shanti A. 15,308). As microscopic vision was present, there might be telescopes too. Planets can be seen with mirrors as well as lenses. Vyas must have “seen” Neptune ; its proof lies in the fact that he says that it is bluish white (Shyama). Neptune is, in fact, bluish white in colour. Hence we conclude that Neptune was known to Vyas in 5561 B.C.

PLUTO (was also known to Vyas in 5561 B.C)

Krittikaam Peedayan Teekshnaihi Nakshatram……[30-Bheeshma.3]

Vyas states that there was one Nakshatra, i.e, some immobile liminary troubling Krittika (Pleides) with its sharp rays. This “star” in Krit- tika must have been some “planet”. It must have been stationary for many years, that is why Vyas called it Nakshatra which means a thing that does not move according to Mahabharat itself [Na Ksharati Iti Makshatram].

Hence the Nakshatra was a planet moving very slowly like pluto which takes nine years to cross one Nakshatra of 13 degrees. My assumption that this Nakshatra was Pluto gets confirmed by B.O.R.I (Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute?) Edition which states thus :

Krittikasu Grahasteevro Nakshatre Prathame Jvalan…… [26- Bhishma.3]

Some editions mention ‘Grahasteekshnah’. Thus Teevra, Teekshana and Nakshatra are the names of one and the same planet (graha) which was in Krittlka in 5561 B.C. Let us see if Vyas has given these names to Pluto and if Pluto was in Krittika. It is stated that Krittika was troubled with sharp rays by that planet – this indicates that it was Nirayan Krittika.

Pluto was at 175 degrees in 1979. It takes 248 years per rotation. 1979+5561=7540 years. 7540 divided by 248 gives 30.403223 turns. 0.403223 turn means 145 degrees. 175 – 145 = 30 degrees. This is the site of Krittika. Thus it is proved beyond doubt that Vyas bas men- tioned the position of Pluto, which was discovered to the modern world in 1930. Vyas could have used his Yogic Vision or mathematical brain or a lens or some other device to discover Teevra, Teekshna’ or Nakshatra or Pluto.

Thus all the three so-called ‘New’ planets are discovered from Mahabharat. It is usually held that before the discovery of Herschel in 1781 AD, only five planets were known to the world. This belief is wrong because Vyas has mentioned ‘seven Great planets’, three times in Mahabharat.

Deepyamanascha Sampetuhu Divi Sapta Mahagrahah….[2-Bhishma.17]

This stanza states that the seven great planets were brilliant and shining; so Rahu and Ketu are out of question. Rahu and Ketu are described as Graha’ 23 meaning Nodal points. (Parus means a node). Evidently Rahu and Ketu are not included in these seven great planets. The Moon also is not included, because it was not visible on that day of Amavasya with Solar Eclipse. From the positions discovered by me and given by Vyas it is seen that Mars, Sun, Mercury, Jupiter, Uranus, Venus and Neptune were the seven great planets accumulated in a small field extending from Anuradha to Purva Bhadrapada. So they appeared to Ved-Vyas as colliding with each other, during total solar eclipse.

Nissaranto Vyadrushanta Suryaat Sapta Mahagrahah….[4-Karna 37].

This stanza clearly states that these seven great planets were ‘seen’ moving away from the Sun. As these are ‘seen’, Rahu and Ketu are out of question. This is the statement of sixteenth day of the War, naturally the Moon has moved away from the Sun. Hence, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Uranus, Venus and Neptune are the seven great planets mentioned by Vyas.

Praja Samharane Rajan Somam Sapta grahah Iva……[22-Drona 37].

Here again seven planets are mentioned, excluding the Moon.

Even if we do not consider the planetary positions, from the above three stanzas, it is clear that seven planets are mentioned which do not include the Sun, Moon, Rahu and Ketu. Naturally the conclusion is inevitable that Vyas did know Uranus (Shveta) and Neptune (Shyama) as planets.

If they were known from 5561 years B.C. then why they got forgotten ? The answer is simple, that these two planets, Uranus and Neptune were not useful in predicting the future of a person. So they lost impor- tance and in the course of time they were totally forgotten. But, in any case, Neelakantha from 17th century knew these two planets very weIl. Neelakantha is about a hundered years ancient than Her- schel, and he writes that Mahapata (Uranus) is a famous planet in the Astronomical science of India . He also mentions the planet ‘Parigha’ i.e. Neptune . 22 So both were known in India , at least one Hundered years before Herschel. Vyas is 7343 years ancient than Herschel, but still he knew all the three planets Uranus, Neptune and Pluto.

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ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE

Kshaya or Vishvaghasra Paksha

A fortnight of only thirteen days is told by Vyasa which occured just before the great War. Such a fortnight comes at the interval of 22 years. Calculations show that at 5562nd B.C. Kshaya Paksha did occur. It had occured 1962 and 1940. 1962+5562 = 7524 is completely divisi- ble by 22.

Amavasya confirmed

Krishna and Karna fixed the day of War on Amavasya (Udyog 142). Vyas also indicates in Bhishma 2 & 3 that the War started on the day second Amayasya, because two successive Amavasyas appeared then. Bhishma died on the day after 67 (58+9) nights from the onset of the War, on the occasion Uttarayan i.e. 22nd December. So the War must have commenced on 16th October. Let us see if Amavasya comes on this day.

In 1979, Amavasya was on 21st of October. Amavasyas repeat after the intervals of 29.53058 days. The Lunar year is of 354.367 days while the Solar year is 365.25 days. 1979+5561 = 7540 multiplied by 365.25 and divided by 354.367 gives 7771.5616 Lunar years. 0.5616 Lunar year means 199.0125 days. 199.0125 divided by 29.53058 gives 6.7392005. This indicates that 6 Amavasyas are completed and 0.7392005 lunar month or 22 days are left. These 22 days are left for 21st October and we have to go behind upto 16th October. So adding these 6 days to 22 we get 28 days. After 28 days Amavasya can occur. After 29 days it always occurs. Thus on 15th and 16th October 5562nd year B.C, there were two successive amavasyas as mentioned by Vyas.

Another method gives the same conclusion. At the interval of 19 years the Amavasya falls on the same date. 19×365.25 divided by 29.53058 gives 235.00215. So in 19 years 235 Amavasya are completed. I found that on 17th October 1963, there was an Amavasya. 1963+5561 = 7524 divided by 19 gives 396. This division is complete, so there was an Amavasya. Thus it is established that Vyas has reported Amavasya correctly.

Eclipses

Vyas has mentioned that there was Solar as well as Lunar eclipses in one month at the time of Mahabharat War. Calculations confirm that in October 5561 year B.C, both the Solar and Lunar eclipses did occur. Rahu and Ketu were in Uttara Ashadha at 273 deg. & 279 deg. so total eclipse of the Sun took place on the Margashirsha Amavasya day Only 13 days earlier, according to Vyasa, there was Pournirma with lunar eclipse, causing pallor of the Moon. Thirteen days earlier the sun would have been 13 deg. behind at (279 – 13 =) 266 in Purva Ashadha. It was Pournima so the Moon was diagonally opposite at (266-180=) 86 deg. in Punarvasu, just beyond Mruga, so it was Margashirsha Pournima though it is wrongly or enigmatically told to be Kartika Pournima. Rahu was at 273 deg., so Ketu was diagonally opposite in Punarvasu, so the ellipse of the moon was possible which was not total.

A Big comet

Vyas has mentioned that at the time of Mahabharat War a big comet was seen just beyond Pushya Nakshtra. There are many comets. Indian Astro- nomical works refer to more than 500 comets, but big comets are very few. Haley’s comet is one of the big comets which comes at the regu- lar intervals of 77 years. It was seen in 1910 and 1987. If we add 1910+5561 = 7271. 7271 is divisible completely by 77. Evidently it seems that it was Haley’s comet was seen at the Mahabharat War.

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Conclusion

All the twelve planets confirm their said positions on 16th October 5561 years B.C. along with two Amavasyas, two eclipses, Kshaya Paksha and a Comet. Thus, in all 18 mathematical positions fix the same date. Therefore, we have to accept this date of the Mahabharat War, if we want to be scientific. Please note that all the twelve planets will come in the same positions again only after 2229 crores of years. That means it will never happen again in the life of our earth, because life of the earth is only 400 crores of years. So the date of the Mahabharat War is pin-pointed as 16th October 5561 B.C.

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P.V.Vartak states that the position of saptarishis during the Mahabharata war was near Magha and it was exactly at the same position in 5561 B.C.During Aug.1990,Saptarishis were in Vishaka and astronomers say that Saptarishis were in Vishaka during a major period of 20th century A.D.

Saptarishis always move in the reverse direction (i.e) from Revathi to Ashwini.Thus going backwards we find the position of Saptarishis in each century.They remain for

100 years in each star(nakshatra).The position of Saptarishis in each century:

19th cen A.D : Anuradha

18th cen A.D : Jyestha

17th cen A.D : Moola

16th cen A.D : Poorvashada

15th cen A.D : Uttarashada

14th cen A.D : Shravana

13th cen A.D : Dhanishta

12th cen A.D : Satabhishak

11th cen A.D : Poorva-bhadhrapada

10th cen A.D : Uttara-bhadhrapada

9th cen A.D : Revathi

8th cen A.D : Ashwini

7th cen A.D : Bharani

6th cen A.D : Krittika

5th cen A.D : Rohini

4th cen A.D : Mrigashirsha

3th cen A.D : Ardra

2th cen A.D : Punarvasu

1th cen A.D : Pushya

1th cen B.C : Aslesha

2th cen B.C : Magha

Therefore,in 2nd cen B.C they were in Magha.So,in 29th cen B.C they were in Magha(200+2700) and similarly in 56th cen B.C(2900+2700) they were once again in Magha.Because once in every 2700 years they come back to the same star.

In 56th cen B.C (i.e) between 5600 B.C and 5500 B.C they were in Magha.So in 5561 B.C they were in Magha as stated by Vyasa.So the date given by Vartak is probably the correct one.

But there are some mistakes in the article.

As for Kali yuga, it started when the Saptarishis entered Magha as stated in Vishnu Puran. Parasara states that when Krishna returned to His Eternal Abode they were in Magha and hence Kali had started then.

As Krishna was present in this world Kali did not come when Saptarishis were in Magha.When He departed Kali came.

Parasara states that Kali would attain ‘Teevra’

(strength) when the Saptarishis enter Poorva-Bhadhrapada which would be about 1600 years after Kali era begun.Thus it is wrong to say,as Vartak claims,that Kali starts only when Saptarishis enter Poorva-bhadhrapada.Parasara also states that 1500 years would passby between Parikshit,the grandson of Arjuna, and Mahapadma Nanda’s coronation.

As Krishna departed 36 years after the the war Kali yuga should have began in 5525 B.C.

Parasara says that Kali Yuga attains ‘teevra’ when saptarishis enter Poorva bhadrapada.