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One human being does not create a language. It evolves over a period of time. We heard many pitta(bird) stories like this before ___________________________________________________ Then who spoke Tamil before Agastya? And what was the language spoken in the South before Agstya brought Tamil down from the North? If you understand what I and Verma are talkign about then write some meaningful stuff Sarswathi is the daughter of Brahma, and she is also his wife. ___________________________________________________ By the same logic, everyone on earth is created by Brahma and every female on earth becomes a sister of every male. That means Your wife is your sister and that makes you and Incestuous beast - How is that? All mythological movies made in India after Independance are nothing but scare tactics and lies ___________________________________________________ Yes they are and those lies include your stupid Aryan Dravidian theory that died long back! Sanskrit was never a Mass language, that is why it is dying. ___________________________________________________ On so Sanskrit was a class language? What about English then? You diehard Aryanists want to preserve it by telling thousand lies. ___________________________________________________ I have p[roved every word of you a lie with solid evidence on my side and you shamelessly repeat those things again and again - If you think you have enough stuff to prove my points wrong then post them - You post your stuff and I will post mine and let us see what woulod prevail - Arfe you willing to accept this challenge? IF YOU CAN PROVE YOUR POINT THEN I IWLL AGREE WITH YOU AND SHUT UP WILL YOU DO THE SAME OTHERWISE? (I hope you would answer this atleasdt this time without running away) PS: Mr. Rowdy, why are you afraid to identify with your real name? ___________________________________________________ I have identified myself with my name many times here and even the owners of TP know me well - Tell me one good reason how my name makes a difference to the discussion I will put it up immediately, wherever you want me to! Deal!! PS: If you have not flunked your 10th standard 10 times, you would understand that the genetic data would not lie :))

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 12, Sep 2007 1:36:36 AM IST

Rowdy, One human being does not create a language. It evolves over a period of time. We heard many pitta(bird) stories like this before. Sarswathi is the daughter of Brahma, and she is also his wife. All mythological movies made in India after Independance are nothing but scare tactics and lies. Regional languages will not die becuase they evolved from masses. Sanskrit was never a Mass language, that is why it is dying. You diehard Aryanists want to preserve it by telling thousand lies. Tough Luck!! PS: Mr. Rowdy, why are you afraid to identify with your real name?

Posted by: Mr. M kakulavaram At: 12, Sep 2007 0:09:34 AM IST

If I am not wrong, Agastya existed long before 2000 BCE, he belonged to the so called Aryan Category and if you agree to the point that agastya brought Tamil down to south before 2000 BCE, it clearly states that the so called Aryans existed even before 2000 BCE and that clearly proves the Aryan Invasion Theory wrong :)) By teh way even the oldest Tamil literature refers to Southern Part of Inda but not the Northern - So the only possibility in this case is that Agastya was the person who created this language called Tamil and well well as per yoru Hypothesis, Tamil becomes an Aryan Language :))

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 11:27:10 PM IST

And of course, to repeat my question - If Tamil existed before Sanskrit in North India then what about hte words like Simgam and Katkamrigam?

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 9:55:05 PM IST

Once again, any meaningful discussion on this issue is possible only through solid evidence and proof - History will not change if Sanskrit dies completely or Vanishes out of Globe - as such with the Advent of English, the regional languages in India are destined to meet the same fate as Sanskrit within a few hundred years - but thats a different issue) If you choose to just talk talk and talk without any evidence and present all the false stories, then be rest assured I can do the same thing too -May be I can start an argument that Tamil is a foreign langauge brought to India by the outsiders - After all it does not require any proof or evidence to follow your path :))

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 9:17:59 PM IST

Now that you yourself agree to say that Sage Agastya Mahamuni brought Tamil Language from Mount Kailas down to south. It is an universally agreed point. This also means that Tamil was a language that was prevailing in India upto Mount Kailash and the people were talking Tamil only till then ___________________________________________________ Once again your assumptions - I just projected the view of the other side of the argument abolut Tamil - And of course the INDIAN CULTURE EXISTED EVEN BEFORE Agastya and Sanskrit was very much prevalant long long before him - and the article clearly means that it was Agastya who created NON EXISTANT Tamil and took it down to south - so if you agree to that point htere is nothing to argue :)) - Some people say even Telugu existed long before Tamil took birth. And my question still remains .. why is there is no link between Tamil and North India ever? And what happened to your original version of Vedas? Why dont you post it? And abotu your post 'Later only the Aryans, the red skinned people whose origin is Iran also called Persians reached India since the old persia did not have anything except sand-sahara. However some animals were grazing and the same animals were persians' food' ______________________________________ People have clearly agreed that tehre is no race called Aryans and you are going back to the same point contradicting yourself :)) Say it straight - Catre bigots tried to exploit the theory forwarded my Max Mueller and tried to propogate the Aryan Dravidian THeory and fell flat on their nose! Malakpet Rowdy argued a great deal here worthing reading but unfortunately he kept on insisting his own point that is an absolute mistake. He went on depending upon the books on Indology,he would have read sometime back. Probably even now he may be taking the help of some men who had their own ideas contrary to the history and is typing in this portal. ___________________________________________________ In my references I have only been presenting the other side of the argument with solid archelogical evidence and scientific Data - which clearly suggests that the Aryan Invasion is a Myth! If Tamil already existed all the way from Indian ocean to Mount Kailash, then what was the need for him to bring it back to South? Does anybody need to Bring Telugu from Hyderabad to Nellore or Vizag? SO the article cclearly suggests that TAMIL NEVER EXISTED BEFORE SANSKRIT! - Any answers? I am still asking you - IF YOU HAVE ANY EVIDENCE ABOUT WHATEVER YOU ARE POSTING HERE, SHOW IT UP - And by the way it is you people who have ideas contrary to the history and You guys are trying to manipulate it - but well YOu can not manipulate the History that has scientific evidence - In tamilnadu one can find tamil is the language used for conducting poojas in all the hindu temples. ___________________________________________________ Are you sure about the Meenakshi Temple of Madurai? How about Kancheepuram? How about Arunachalam Shiva Temple? Have you visited any of those? By the way Sanskrit is known all over India and even Beyond - What about Tamil beyond Tamilnadu? Sanskrit is offered as a Second Language all-over India and we have Sanskrit scholars all over India - What about Tamil? Sanskrit literature refers to every part of India even before the birth of Tamil Literature - What abotu Tamil? Does it have any North Indian references? And yes - you said Even great philosophers like Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a telugu born in Tamilnadu (Tiruttani)several times mentioned about the silly commitments on Indian Philosophy while comparing with that of western philosophy in his books on 'The Philosophy of the East & West'. He never personally agreed to the point that the westerners are more red, more industrious, more clever, more rich, more brainy. He went on emphasizing that the Indian philosophy is the mother of all philosophical trends prevailing and side by side supported the utterances of Sri Swami Viveknanda while in Chicago on the matter of world religions. ___________________________________________________ Exactly - so they have clearly agreed to the fact that the Aryan Race never existed and everythoing was 'INDIAN' - (They said Indian - Not Tamil?) and it was only a creation of the Fanatics Malakpet Rowdy can also visit Periyar Thidal near tamil newspaper office Daily Thanthi and enter the D.K. Party office and go through all the books in English about the north indian people and their culture, languages, their original origin etc. Please meet me again here. ___________________________________________________ Devendra Varma can also visit the BJP office in Ahmedabad, Gujarat ( Yes, Modi's Gujarat) or Shiv Sena Office in Mumbai and read about Hwo Tamilians and Tamil-Telugus are trying to spread the lies about Race and failing miserably :)) - Buddy, if you can refer to DK/DMK/Periyar, I can refer to BJP/Shiv-Sena/Modi .. lolz ... I have a counter to every point you say : AND YEAH BEFORE I CONCLUDE, SINCE YOU YOURSELF TALKED ABOUT SWAMI VIVEKANANDA - HERE IS WHAT HE HAD TO SAY ABOUT ARYANS: 'Yes, the secular scholarship is in deep trouble. But they have a solid reason to feel assured that it will take decades for this truth to overcome the billions of pages of falsehood printed and circulated so far. For the grains of truth to emerge from this mountain of falsehood will take a life's time.' Do not believe such silly things as there was a race of mankind in South India called Dravidians differing widely from another race in northern India called the Aryans. This is entirely unfounded.'' This is not from a saffron scholar of the 21st century. But Swami Vivekananda said it before an audience in the then Madras city as the 19th century was drawing to a close. Not knowing where the bright Aryans came from, ''of late, there was an attempt made to prove,'' he laughed and said: ''Aryans lived on the Swiss lakes.'' Yet the theory trotted out by F.Max Mueller in 1848 tracing the history of Hinduism to the invasion of indigenous people by Aryans around 1500 BC has obsessed India since then. .... Swami Vivekananda on Aryan Invasion Theory 'Our archaeologists' dreams of India being full of dark-eyed aborigines, and the bright Aryans came from - the Lord knows where. According to some, they came from Central Tibet; others will have it that they came from Central Asia. There are patriotic Englishmen who think that the Aryans were all red haired. Others, according to their idea, think that they were all black-haired. If the writer happens to be a black-haired man, the Aryans were all black-haired. Of late, there was an attempt made to prove that the Aryans lived on Swiss lake. I should not be sorry if they had been all drowned there, theory and all. Some say now that they lived at the North Pole. Lord bless the Aryans and their habitations! As for as the truth of these theories, there is notone word in our scriptures, not one, to prove that the Aryans came from anywhere outside of India, and in ancient India was included Afghanistan. There it ends...' 'And the theory that the Shudra caste were all non-Aryans and they were a multitude, is equally illogical and irrational. It could not have been possible in those days that a few Aryans settled and lived there with a hundred thousand slaves at their command. The slaves would have eaten them up, made chutney of them in five minutes. The only explanation is to be found in the Mahabharat, which says that in the beginning of the Satya Yoga there was only one caste, the Brahmins, and then by differences of occupations they went on dividing themselves into different castes, and that is the only true and rational explanation that has been given. And in the coming Satya Yuga all other castes will have to go back to the same condition.' (The Complete Work of Swami Vivekananda, Vol.III Page 293.) ___________________________________________________ AND YOU ARE YET TO ANSWER MY QUESTIONS ABOUT RIVER SARASWATI! Why are you avoiding hte discussion on that front?

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 9:05:46 PM IST

Attn Mr alakpet Rowdy: Now that you yourself agree to say that Sage Agastya Mahamuni brought Tamil Language from Mount Kailas down to south. It is an universally agreed point. This also means that Tamil was a language that was prevailing in India upto Mount Kailash and the people were talking Tamil only till then. This is a revealed and open meaning from your own words in the rejoinder and counter issued to me. Later only the Aryans, the red skinned people whose origin is Iran also called Persians reached India since the old persia did not have anything except sand-sahara. However some animals were grazing and the same animals were persians' food. However the same persians reached India and found lavish green, drinking water rivers, arable soil, beautiful and civilized men and women living harmoniously all times. This provoked a great jealous in the mnds of persians and slowly started to occuppy the space as much as possible and simultaneously started to drive away the dravidians who reached the southern parts of the country. Aryans started to dominate a great deal in all respects and continued to be Indians with their red skin. They married the red skinned women in their place of inhabitating (present North India)but the hatred for dark skin remained within themselves like poison in the body of Cobra. Later some Aryans remained in the south itself and are presently called 'Aiyers' - 'Iyers' which means 'aryars' originally. Malakpet Rowdy argued a great deal here worthing reading but unfortunately he kept on insisting his own point that is an absolute mistake. He went on depending upon the books on Indology,he would have read sometime back. Probably even now he may be taking the help of some men who had their own ideas contrary to the history and is typing in this portal. None is worried. I therefore suggest Malakpet Rowdy to go over to Chennai city and visit Banarasiwala Book shop at the tip of Luz Church Road near Anjaneyar temple in Mylpore area and refer to some books on Indian Indology and their books are authority on indology. Even great philosophers like Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a telugu born in Tamilnadu (Tiruttani)several times mentioned about the silly commitments on Indian Philosophy while comparing with that of western philosophy in his books on 'The Philosophy of the East & West'. He never personally agreed to the point that the westerners are more red, more industrious, more clever, more rich, more brainy. He went on emphasizing that the Indian philosophy is the mother of all philosophical trends prevailing and side by side supported the utterances of Sri Swami Viveknanda while in Chicago on the matter of world religions. Ultimately it goes without saying that Aryans are non-Indians and non-Hindus and all the Indians living in India before the arrival of the Aryans are the true and original Indians talking Tamil as their mother-tongue.Sanskrit was a foreign language brought into India by non-Indians and non-Hindus and was adopted by all except southerners But later when sanskrit started to mix with the localy spoken languages in India, it met its own death and it was named as 'mrutha bhaasha'(dead language). In my opinion I called sanskrit not as a dead language but a murdered language. Though there are many a number of Universities in India offering sanskrit,the response to opt is a big zero only. In tamilnadu one can find tamil is the language used for conducting poojas in all the hindu temples.By this one is able to understand his mother tongue being used to convey all his feelings to God in the temple in his own language. Malakpet Rowdy can also visit Periyar Thidal near tamil newspaper office Daily Thanthi and enter the D.K. Party office and go through all the books in English about the north indian people and their culture, languages, their original origin etc. Please meet me again here.

Posted by: Mr. Devendra Verma Verma At: 9, Sep 2007 3:26:42 PM IST

This is Romila Thapar's U-turn in a letter to the editor of The Hindu :)) http://www.hindu.com/2004/03/22/stories/2004032201661001.htm

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 12:07:15 PM IST

One more - With a Scientific Perspective _________________________________________ Telling the true story of history Genetic Tests against the fictional Aryan Race By Sandhya Jain THE ‘history’ being taught in Indian schools is factually wrong and ignores convincing scientific evidence from the fields of archaeology, geology, genetics, and archaeo-astronomy. It is also contrary to ancient Indian literary evidence, claims the world famous Vedic acharya, David Frawley (Vamadeva Shastri), Director, American Institute of Vedic Studies. During the course of a rather lengthy visit to India earlier in the year, Frawley stressed the need to thoroughly revamp Indian history by incorporating recent discoveries within a multi-disciplinary framework that incorporates all relevant data in a consistent fashion. In a paper co-authored with N. Rajaram, Frawley points to recent articles in the British Journal Current Biology, that have major implications for India. Based on genetic tests, the articles note that a key mitochondria DNA of the Western Eurasian strain accounts for no more than 5.2 per cent in Indian populations, as against over 70 per cent in European countries like Germany. Simply put, this means that the supposed Aryan invasion is contradicted by genetics. This means that there was no ‘Aryan invasion,’ not even any significant ‘Aryan migration.’ What is more, the study shows that this West Eurasian strain is present in roughly the same proportion in North and South India. This means that there is no genetic divide between the so-called Dravidians and the Aryans in India. Hence, according to the latest scientific evidence, both the Aryan invasion and the Aryan-Dravidian dichotomy have no basis. Other evidence, says Frawley, also points to the same conclusion. Archaeological discoveries over the past fifty years have repeatedly shown the Aryan invasion theory found in Indian history books to be false. For instance, the course of the ancient Saraswati river, discovered by the late V.S. Wakankar and his associates, matches the geography of North India as depicted in the Rig Veda’s descriptions of the ocean-going Saraswati before the river dried up around circa 2000 BC. The Geological Society of India has proved this point from various perspectives. That is why most Harappan sites are located not on the Indus but on the banks of the Saraswati, as it was their central region. The literary evidence also challenges the Aryan invasion myth. Vedic literature describes a maritime society with a vast cosmology of many oceans and full of oceanic symbolism. The common prayer is for safety in crossing the sea by ships. Frawley points out that such a prayer is used by navigators, not by nomadic invaders, and as such the Rig Veda could not have been composed in land-locked Afghanistan. Indeed, Indian cotton has been found at sites in Mexico and Peru dating to 2500 BC and even earlier, indicating maritime activity in ancient times. Similarly, Vedic astronomy and calendar systems show a sophisticated knowledge of observational astronomy, including calendars of the Krittika equinox (Taurus equinox) of about 2500 BCE. This fits in well with the maritime nature of Vedic society, as navigation is impossible without knowledge of astronomy. A study of Harappan archaeology and Vedic literature shows that Vedic mathematical texts (Sulva Sutras) were used in the design and construction of carefully planned cities of the Harappan civilisation. The American mathematician, A. Seidenberg, has established that both Old Babylonia (1900-1750 BC) and the Egyptian Middle Kingdom (2050-1800 BC) borrowed heavily from Vedic mathematics, which was already well known in Harappan times. Natwar Jha’s decipherment of the Indus script shows that the Harappan civilisation belongs to the later Vedic period. The recent deciphering of the 'World’s Oldest Writing' shows that the core of the Rig Veda must already have existed by 3500 BC. At the same time, there is no evidence – physical or literary – of invading hordes, horse-riding warriors from Afghanistan with iron weapons, Eurasian skeletal types, destroyed cities, or any of the standard images portrayed by the Aryan invasion theory. The theory, Frawley states, was an offshoot of a nineteenth century colonial mindset that projected the experience of colonising Asia and Africa onto Vedic times and called it ‘history.’ It came into being when there was no data from archaeology, but has persisted due to political and other considerations. Frawley points out that the ‘history’ Indian children are being taught is totally false and contrary to all scientific and literary evidence. The Aryan invasion model is being upheld by vested interests that have benefited from it politically, who offer no evidence to support their views, and instead accuse those who refute the theory of 'tampering with history.' Frawley laments at this anti-intellectual bias among Indian academics, and points out that most reputed Western archaeologists are rejecting the Aryan invasion/migration scenario. He believes that the present unsatisfactory state of affairs in Indian humanities, particularly history, came about because the generation of Indian scholars after independence continued to look to the West for inspiration, and persisted with the Euro-centric models of the colonial period. Indians, Frawley urges, should take the initiative to rewrite their history books, taking the latest findings and scientific methods into account. It is imperative that children be told the truth about their country’s past. The first point to note in re-writing history, he says, is that the ancient Indians have left ample materials with which to reconstruct the history of the Vedic period. There are the Vedas, the Puranas, the epics and other literature, which contain much in the way of history, though this is often couched in symbolic language, as ancient texts are throughout the world. However, this can be supplemented by archaeology and what we have learnt about ancient ecology, such as the drying up of the Saraswati. The recently deciphered Harappan seals provide inscriptional data to supplement literary records. The seals deciphered so far show that ancient figures like Rama, Sudasa, Krishna, Puru, etc. were historical persons who lived long before 2000 BC. The deciphered seals, therefore, provide a historical context for both the Harappans and the Vedic people by linking archaeology and Vedic-Puranic literature. Naturally, everything should be based on science and primary sources — not beliefs and prejudices. India had an indigenous and organic development of civilisation from 7000 BCE, starting in sites like Mehrgarh. Frawley states that both the pre-Harappan and Harappan cultures centred on the Saraswati river. The main migration of peoples was from the Saraswati to the Ganges when the Saraswati dried up after 2000 BCE, though there were also some movements in other directions, such as Europe and Central Asia. The Saraswati culture continued, though in modified form, with no intrusion of major populations from Central Asia. While the Saraswati is mirrored in Vedic literature, the Puranas reflect mainly the Ganges. Texts like the Mahabharata, that speak of the Saraswati drying up in the desert (Vinashana Saraswati) show the transitional period. We thus have a vast body of primary data authenticated by scientific methods. The time is therefore ripe for Indians to take the lead and rewrite their history. As Swami Vivekananda said more than a century ago, 'It is for Indians to write Indian history.' Finally, Frawley asserts, the world as a whole will have to give due recognition to Indian culture, with its spiritual and dharmic background, as central to world civilisation. Its importance both for India and the world should not be underestimated. As India is the only civilisation of antiquity to have survived, it is the responsibility of Indians to discover not only their own history, but also that of the world. Revamping the way history is taught in Indian schools would be a major step in that direction. This is a scientific and spiritual imperative, not only for India, but for the whole world.

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 11:39:59 AM IST

One more article that Hits the Aryan Invasion Theory for a Six --------------------------------------------------- the myth of the aryan invasion The aryan invasion By Svami B.V. Giri Introduction The aryan invasion theory has been one of the most controversial historical topics for well over a century. However, it should be pointed out that it remains just that – a theory. To date no hard evidence has proven the aryan invasion theory to be fact. In this essay we will explain the roots of this hypothesis and how, due to recent emergence of new evidence over the last couple of decades, the validity of the aryan invasion theory has been seriously challenged. It is indeed ironic that the origin of this theory does not lie in Indian records, but in 19th Century politics and German nationalism. No where in the Vedas, Puranas or Itihasas is there any mention of a Migration or Invasion of any kind. In 1841 M.S. Elphinstone, the first governor of the Bombay Presidency, wrote in his book History of India: 'It is opposed to their (Hindus) foreign origin, that neither in the Code (of Manu) nor, I believe, in the Vedas, nor in any book that is certainly older than the code, is there any allusion to a prior residence or to a knowledge of more than the name of any country out of India. Even mythology goes no further than the Himalayan chain, in which is fixed the habitation of the gods... .To say that it spread from a central point is an unwarranted assumption, and even to analogy; for, emigration and civilization have not spread in a circle, but from east to west. Where, also, could the central point be, from which a language could spread over India, Greece, and Italy and yet leave Chaldea, Syria and Arabia untouched? There is no reason whatever for thinking that the Hindus ever inhabited any country but their present one, and as little for denying that they may have done so before the earliest trace of their records or tradition.’ The Birth of a Misconception Interest in the field of Indology during the 19th Century was of mixed motivations. Many scholars such as August Wilhelm von Schlegal, Hern Wilhelm von Humboldt, and Arthur Schopenhauer lauded praise upon the Vedic literatures and their profound wisdom, others were less than impressed. To accept that there was an advanced civilization outside the boundaries of Europe, at a time before the Patriarchs Abraham and Moses had made their covenant with the Almighty was impossible to conceive of for most European scholars, who harbored a strong Christian tendency. Most scholars of this period were neither archeologists nor historians in the strict sense of the word. Rather, they were missionaries paid by their governments to establish western cultural and racial superiority over the subjugated Indian citizens, through their study of the indigenous religious texts. Consequently, for racial, political and religious reasons, early European indologists created a myth that still survives to this day. It was established by linguists that Sanskrit, Iranian and European languages all belonged to the same family, categorizing them as ‘Indo-European’ languages. It was assumed that all these people originated from one homeland where they spoke a common language (which they called ‘Proto-Indo-European’ or PIE) which later developed into Sanskrit, Latin, Greek etc. They then needed to ascertain where this homeland was. By pure speculation, it was proposed that this homeland was either southeast Europe or Central Asia. Harappa Harappa and Mohenjo-daro The discovery of ruins in the Indus Valley (Harappa and Mohenjo-daro) was considered by indologists like Wheeler as proof of their conjectures – that a nomadic tribe from foreign lands had plundered India. It was pronounced that the ruins dated back to a time before the Aryan Invasion, although this was actually never verified. By assigning a period of 200 years to each of the several layers of the pre-Buddhist Vedic literature, indologists arrived at a time frame of somewhere between 1500 and 1000BC for the Invasion of the Aryans. Using Biblical chronology as their sheet anchor, nineteenth century indologists placed the creation of the world at 4000BC 1 and Noah’s flood at 2500BC. They thus postulated that the Aryan Invasion could not have taken place any time before 1500BC. Archeologists excavating the sites at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro found human skeletal remains; this seemed to them to be undeniable evidence that a large-scale massacre had taken place in these cities by the invading Aryan hordes. Prof. G. F. Dales (Former head of department of South-Asian Archaeology and Anthropology, Berkeley University, USA) in his ‘The Mythical Massacre at Mohenjo-daro’, states the following about this evidence: Mohenjo-daro ‘What of these skeletal remains that have taken on such undeserved importance? Nine years of extensive excavations at Mohenjo-daro (1922-31) - a city of three miles in circuit - yielded the total of some 37 skeletons, or parts thereof, that can be attributed with some certainty to the period of the Indus civilizations. Some of these were found in contorted positions and groupings that suggest anything but orderly burials. Many are either disarticulated or incomplete. They were all found in the area of the Lower Town - probably the residential district. Not a single body was found within the area of the fortified citadel where one could reasonably expect the final defense of this thriving capital city to have been made…Where are the burned fortresses, the arrow heads, weapons, pieces of armor, the smashed chariots and bodies of the invaders and defenders? Despite the extensive excavations at the largest Harappan sites, there is not a single bit of evidence that can be brought forth as unconditional proof of an armed conquest and the destruction on the supposed scale of the Aryan Invasion.’ Evidence from the Vedas It was therefore concluded that light-skinned nomads from Central Asia who wiped out the indigenous culture and enslaved or butchered the people, imposing their alien culture upon them had invaded the Indian subcontinent. They then wrote down their exploits in the form of the Rg Veda. This hypothesis was apparently based upon references in the Vedas that point to a conflict between the light-skinned Aryans and the dark-skinned Dasyus. 2 This theory was strengthened by the archeological discoveries in the Indus Valley of the charred skeletal remains that we have mentioned above. Thus the Vedas became nothing more than a series of poetic tales about the skirmishes between two barbaric tribes. However, there are other references in the Rg Veda 3 that point to India being a land of mixed races. The Rg Veda also states that 'We pray to Indra to give glory by which the Dasyus will become Aryans.' 4 Such a statement confirms that to be an Aryan was not a matter of birth. An inattentive skimming through the Vedas has resulted in a gross misinterpretation of social and racial struggles amongst the ancient Indians. North Aryans were pitted against the Southern Dravidians, high-castes against low-castes, civilized orthodox Indians against barbaric heterodox tribals. The hypothesis that of racial hatred between the Aryans and the dark-skinned Dasyus has no sastric foundation, yet some ‘scholars’ have misinterpreted texts to try to prove that there was racial hatred amongst the Aryans and Dravidians (such as the Rg Veda story of Indra slaying the demon Vrta 5 ). Based on literary analysis, many scholars including B.G. Tilak, Dayananda Saraswati and Aurobindo dismissed any idea of an Aryan Invasion. For example, if the Aryans were foreign invaders, why is it that they don’t name places outside of India as their religious sites? Why do the Vedas only glorify holy places within India? Max Mueller What is an ‘Aryan’? The Sanskrit word ‘Aryan’ refers to one who is righteous and noble. It is also used in the context of addressing a gentleman (Arya-putra, Aryakanya etc). 6 Nowhere in the Vedic literature is the word used to denote race or language. This was a concoction by Max Mueller who, in 1853, introduced the word ‘Arya’ into the English language as referring a particular race and language. He did this in order to give credibility to his Aryan race theory (see Part 2). However in 1888, when challenged by other eminent scholars and historians, Mueller could see that his reputation was in jeopardy and made the following statement, thus refuting his own theory - 'I have declared again and again that if I say Aryas, I mean neither blood nor bones, nor hair, nor skull; I mean simply those who speak an Aryan language...to me an ethnologist who speaks of Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes and hair, is as great a sinner as a linguist who speaks of a dolichocephalic dictionary or a brachycephalic grammar.' (Max Mueller, Biographies of Words and the Home of the Aryas, 1888, pg 120) But the dye had already been cast! Political and Nationalist groups in Germany and France exploited this racial phenomenon to propagate the supremacy of an assumed Aryan race of white people. Later, Adolf Hitler used this ideology to the extreme for his political hegemony and his barbaric crusade to terrorize Jews, Slavs and other racial minorities, culminating in the holocaust of millions of innocent people. According to Mueller’s etymological explanation of ‘Aryan’, the word is derived from ‘ar’ (to plough, to cultivate). Therefore Arya means ‘a cultivator, or farmer’. This is opposed to the idea that the Aryans were wandering nomads. V.S. Apte's Sanskrit-English Dictionary relates the word Arya to the root ‘r-’ to which the prefix ‘a’ has been added in order to give a negating meaning. Therefore the meaning of Arya is given as ‘excellent, best’, followed by ‘respectable’ and as a noun, ‘master, lord, worthy, honorable, excellent,’ ‘upholder of Arya values, and further: teacher, employer, master, father-in-law, friend.’ No Nomads Kenneth Kennedy of Cornell University has recently proven that there was no significant influx of people into India during 4500 to 800BC. Furthermore it is impossible for sites stretching over one thousand miles to have all become simultaneously abandoned due to the Invasion of Nomadic Tribes. There is no solid evidence that the Aryans belonged to a nomadic tribe. In fact, to suggest that a nomadic horde of barbarians wrote books of such profound wisdom as the Vedas and Upanisads is nothing more than an absurdity and defies imagination. Although in the Rg Veda Indra is described as the ‘Destroyer of Cities,’ the same text mentions that the Aryan people themselves were urban dwellers with hundreds of cities of their own. They are mentioned as a complex metropolitan society with numerous professions and as a seafaring race. This begs the question, if the Aryans had indeed invaded the city of Harrapa, why did they not inhabit it after? Archeological evidence shows that the city was left deserted after the ‘Invasion’. Colin Renfrew, Prof. of Archeology at Cambridge, writes in his book Archeology and Language: The Puzzle of Indo-European Origins’ - ‘It is certainly true that the gods invoked do aid the Aryas by over-throwing forts, but this does not in itself establish that the Aryas had no forts themselves. Nor does the fleetness in battle, provided by horses (who were clearly used primarily for pulling chariots), in itself suggest that the writers of these hymns were nomads. Indeed the chariot is not a vehicle especially associated with nomads’ Horses and Chariots The Invasion Theory was linked to references of horses in the Vedas, assuming that the Aryans brought horses and chariots with them, giving military superiority that made it possible for them to conquer the indigenous inhabitants of India. Indologists tried to credit this theory by claiming that the domestication of the horse took place just before 1500BC. Their proof for this was that there were no traces of horses and chariots found in the Indus Valley. The Vedic literature nowhere mentions riding in battle and the word ‘asva’ for horse was often used figuratively for speed. Recent excavations by Dr.S.R. Rao have discovered both the remains of a horse from both the Late Harrapan Period and the Early Harrapan Period (dated before the supposed Invasion by the Aryans), and a clay model of a horse in Mohenjo-daro. Since Dr. Rao’s discoveries other archeologists have uncovered numerous horse bones of both domesticated and combat types. New discoveries in the Ukraine also proves that horse riding was prevalent as early as 4000BC – thus debunking the misconception that the Aryan nomads came riding into history after 2000BC. Another important point in this regard is that nomadic tribes do not use chariots. They are used in areas of flat land such as the Gangetic plains of Northern India. An Invasion of India from Central Asia would require crossing mountains and deserts – a chariot would be useless for such an exercise. Much later, further excavations in the Indus Valley (and pre-Indus civilizations) revealed horses and evidence of the wheel on the form of a seal showing a spoked wheel (as used on chariots). An Iron Culture Similarly, it was claimed that another reason why the Invading Aryans gained the upper hand was because their weapons were made of iron. This was based upon the word ‘ayas’ found in the Vedas, which was translated as iron. Another reason was that iron was not found in the Indus Valley region. However, in other Indo-European languages, ayas refers to bronze, copper or ore. It is dubious to say that ayas only referred to iron, especially when the Rg Veda does not mention other metals apart from gold, which is mentioned more frequently than ayas. Furthermore, the Yajur and Atharva Vedas refer to different colors of ayas. This seems to show that he word was a generic term for all types of metal. It is also mentioned in the Vedas that the dasyus (enemies of the Aryans) also used ayas to build their cities. Thus there is no hard evidence to prove that the ‘Aryans invaders’ were an iron-based culture and their enemies were not. Yajna-vedhis Throughout the Vedas, there is mention of fire-sacrifices (yajnas) and the elaborate construction of vedhis (fire altars). Fire-sacrifices were probably the most important aspect of worshiping the Supreme for the Aryan people. However, the remains of yajna-vedhis (fire altars) were uncovered in Harrapa by B.B. Lal of the Archeological Survey of India, in his excavations at the third millenium site of Kalibangan. The geometry of these yajna-vedhis is explained in the Vedic texts such as the Satpatha-brahmana. The University of California at Berkley has compared this geometry to the early geometry of Ancient Greece and Mesopotamia and established that the geometry found in the Vedic scriptures should be dated before 1700BC. Such evidence proves that the Harrapans were part of the Vedic fold. Objections in the Realm of Linguistics and Literature There are various objections to the conclusions reached by the indologists concerning linguistics. Firstly they have never given a plausible excuse to explain how a Nomadic Invasion could have overwhelmed the original languages in one of the most densely populated regions of the ancient world. Secondly, there are more linguistic changes in Vedic Sanskrit than there are in classical Sanskrit since the time of Panini (aprox.500 BC). So although they have assigned an arbitrary figure of 200 year periods to each of the four Vedas, each of these periods could have existed for any number of centuries and the 200 year figure is totally subjective and probably too short a figure. Another important point is that none of the Vedic literatures refer to any Invasion from outside or an original homeland from which the Aryans came from. They only focus upon the region of the Seven Rivers (sapta-sindhu). The Puranas refer to migrations of people out of India, which explains the discoveries of treaties between kings with Aryan names in the Middle East, and references to Vedic gods in West Asian texts in the second millenium BC. However, the indologists try to explain these as traces of the migratory path of the Aryans into India. North-South Divide Indologists have concluded that the original inhabitants of the Indus Valley civilization were of Dravidian descent. This poses another interesting question. If the Aryans had invaded and forced the Dravidians down to the South, why is there no Aryan/Dravidian divide in the respective religious literatures and historical traditions? Prior to the British, the North and South lived in peace and there was a continuous cultural exchange between the two. Sanskrit was the common language between the two regions for centuries. Great acaryas such as Sankara, Ramanuja, Madhva, Vallabha, and Nimbarka were all from South, yet they are all respected in North India. Prior to them, there were great sages from the South such as Bodhayana and Apastamba. Agastya Rsi is placed in high regard in South India as it is said that he brought the Tamil language from Mount Kailasa to the South. 7 Yet he is from the North! Are we to understand that the South was uninhabited before the Aryan Invasion? If not, who were the original inhabitants of South India, who accepted these newcomers from the North without any struggle or hostility? Pasupati Siva Saivism The advocates of the Invasion theory argue that the inhabitants of Indus valley were Saivites (Siva worshippers) and since Saivism is more prevalent among the South Indians, the inhabitants of the Indus valley region must have been Dravidians. Siva worship, however, is not alien to Vedic culture, and is certainly not confined to South India. The words Siva and Sambhu are not Dravidian in origin as some indologists would have us believe (derived from the Tamil words ‘civa’ - to redden, to become angry, and ‘cembu’ - copper, the red metal). Both words have Sanskrit roots – ‘si’ meaning auspicious, gracious, benevolent, helpful, kind, and ‘sam’ meaning being or existing for happiness or welfare, granting or causing happiness, benevolent, helpful, kind. These words are used in this sense only, right from their very first occurrence. 8 Moreover, some of the most important holy places for Saivites are located in North India: the traditional holy residence of Lord Siva is Mount Kailasa situated in the far north. Varanasi is the most revered and auspicious seat of Saivism. There are verses in the Rg Veda mentioning Siva and Rudra and consider him to be an important deity. Indra himself is called Siva several times in Rg Veda (2:20:3, 6:45:17, 8:93:3). So Siva is not a Dravidian divinity only, and by no means is he a non-Vedic divinity. Indologists have also presented terra-cotta lumps found in the fire-alters in Harappa and taken them to be Siva-lingas, implying that Saivism was prevalent among the Indus valley people. But these terra-cotta lumps have been proved to be the measures for weighing commodities by shopkeepers and merchants. Their weights have been found in perfect integral ratios, in the manner like 1 gm, 2 gms, 5 gms, 10 gms etc. They were not used as the Siva-lingas for worship, but as the weight measurements. The Discovery of the Sarasvati River Whereas the famous River Ganga is mentioned only once in the Rg Veda, the River Sarasvati is mentioned at least sixty times. Sarasvati is now a dry river, but it once flowed all the way from the Himalayas to the ocean across the desert of Rajasthan. Research by Dr. Wakankar has verified that the River Sarasvati changed course at least four times before going completely dry around 1900BC. 9 The latest satellite data combined with field archaeological studies have shown that the Rg Vedic Sarasvati had stopped being a perennial river long before 3000 BC. As Paul-Henri Francfort of CNRS, Paris recently observed – '...We now know, thanks to the field work of the Indo-French expedition that when the proto-historic people settled in this area, no large river had flowed there for a long time.' The proto-historic people he refers to are the early Harappans of 3000 BC. But satellite photos show that a great prehistoric river that was over 7 kilometers wide did indeed flow through the area at one time. This was the Sarasvati described in the Rg Veda. Numerous archaeological sites have also been located along the course of this great prehistoric river thereby confirming Vedic accounts. The great Sarasvati that flowed 'from the mountain to the sea' is now seen to belong to a date long anterior to 3000 BC. This means that the Rg Veda describes the geography of North India long before 3000 BC. All this shows that the Rg Veda must have been in existence no later than 3500 BC. 10 With so many eulogies composed to the River Sarasvati, we can gather that it must have been well known to the Aryans, who therefore could not have been foreign invaders. This also indicates that the Vedas are much older than Mahabharata, which mentions the Sarasvati as a dying river. Discoveries of New Sites Since the initial discoveries of Mohenjo-daro and Harappa on the Ravi and Sindhu rivers in 1922, over 2500 other settlements have been found stretching from Baluchistan to the Ganga and beyond and down to the Tapti Valley. This covers almost a million and a half square kilometers. More than 75% of these sites are concentrated not along the Sindhu, as was believed 70 years ago, but on the banks of the dried up river Sarasvati. The drying up of this great river was a catastrophe, which led to a massive exodus of people in around 2000-1900BC. Some of these people moved southeast, some northwest, and some to Middle-eastern countries such as Iran and Mesopotamia. Dynasties and rulers with Indian names appear and disappear all over west Asia confirming the migration of people from East to West. With so much evidence against the Aryan Invasion theory, one wonders as to why this ugly vestige of British imperialism is still taught in Indian schools today! Such serious misconceptions can only be reconciled by accepting that the Aryans were the original inhabitants of the Indus Valley region, and not a horde of marauding foreign nomads. Such an Invasion never occurred.

Posted by: Malakpet Rowdy At: 9, Sep 2007 10:44:17 AM IST

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