Indian "history", as it is formulated, taught, and propagated today, has been the handiwork of Leftist "intellectuals", ever since Leftist intellectualism came into vogue. And since destruction of national identity is one of the basic tenets of Leftist ideology, it is no wonder that Indian history, as an academic subject, has been falsified on a grand scale, with the sole aim and intention of uprooting and destroying India's national identity and ethos.
Since I had posted various articles on Aryan Invasion Theory on the net, I have been receiving numerous requests and enquiries from various netters to know more about this controversial subject. Most of them requested if there is any comprehnsive and simple book which may provide the other side of the story, other than the common version on Aryans, which had been taught in the schools. Well, recently there have come out several books which deal in details all the aspects of AIT and Indian-Home-For-Aryans Theory (IHAT) in the light of new discoveries unearthed in the last two decades. One such book was mentioned by Mr MV Kamath in his article ( AIT Revisited V...): Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism by Mr Shrikant G. Talageri. The book is divided into three sections, first section mainly deals with the Indian nationalism in the context of AIT, and how self contradictory are the various premises of AIT when weighed against the facts. The second section examines the evidence presented and the arguments advanced by the proponents and scholars of AIT. In the third section, the author demolishes the invasion theory, and propounds with plenty of evidence, that India was the Original Homeland of the "Aryans" or Indo European languages.
Here below I reproduce some excerpts from the concluding chapter (Chapter 23, page 400) of this book. Hope this would answer some of the queries of the interested and inquisitive minds.
This article is contributed by Dr. Dinesh Agrawal
The Rigveda and the Puranas, as we saw, provide conclusive evidence that India was the Original Homeland of the Indo European family of languages.
Not only do the Puranas give the earlier history of Vedic Aryans (i.e. the Purus), who were the authors of the Rigveda, showing them to have originated in south eastern Uttar Pradesh before their ancestors went and settled down in the Punjab; but they also name two other groups of Indo Europeans (the Anus and the Druhyus), with a similar origin in south eastern Uttar Pradesh, and show them to have settled down in areas to the north and northwest of the Vedic Aryans, and even specifically record their migration northwords and away from these areas. The Rigveda, in its Dasarajna hymns, names the historically closest five branches of the present day Indo European languages as having been branches of the Anus and Druhyus, while its mythology proves to be practically identical with the parent mythology of all the later branch mythologies.
In this context, any theory that the Indus Civilization was a "non Aryan" civilization (specifically "Dravidian", or even "Austric") destroyed by "Aryan Invaders" stands exposed as a gross misconception or a motivated fabrication. The facts scream out that the Indus Civilization was an IndoEuropean one.
Practically the only general ground on which it had been branded as "nonAryan" and "Dravidian" was that the scholars, long before the discovery of the civilization, had already formulated a theory of an Aryan Invasion of a Dravidian India. The fact that they had to (as unwittingly admitted by Malati Shendge) quickly and radically reassess the Aryan vs non Aryan equation from a view that "the Aryan invaders of India encountered only a rabble of aboriginal savages" to a view that "the Aryan advent in India was in fact the arrival of barbarians into a region already highly organised into an empire based on a long established tradition of literature urban culture" was, of course, only a minor detail!
However, the evidence in the Rigveda and the Puranas proves conclusively and finally that there was no "Aryan invasion" of India but in fact an outflow of groups of "Aryans" from India who carried the speech family to its present habitats. This knocks out the very basis of the characterization of the Indus Civilization as "pre Aryan" and and "non Aryan".
The only specific ground on which the civilization was branded as a "nonAryan" one was that the major God depicted on the seals was Rudra/Siva in his aspect of Pasupati with many of the characteristic features of Rudra/Siva as described in the texts. This God had been, even earlier, branded as a "Dravidian God" borrowed by the "Aryans", and his sole presence on the seals clinched (in their opinion) the Dravidian character of the civilization. However, as we saw, Rudra/Siva/Pasupati has his perfect counterpart in Graeco Roman mythology. ....
The words Siva and Shambhu are not derived from the Tamil words civa (to redden, to become angry) and cembu (copper, the red metal), but from the Sanskrit roots si (therefore meaning "auspicious, gracious, benevolent, helpful kind": Sanskrit English Dictionary by Sir M. Monier Williams) and sam (therefore meaning "being or existing for happiness or welfare, granting or causing happiness, benevolent, helpful, kind": ibid), and the words are used in this sense only, right from their very first occurence.
Thus the identification of Rudra/Siva in the Indus seals is in fact evidence that the civilization was an Indo European one.
And then we have the decipherment of the Indus seals by Dr SR Rao, already described in an earlier chapter. This decipherment, although still the subject of "controversy" in an invasionist controlled establishment, proves conclusively that the Indus people were Indo Europeans. But those who would like to treat his decipherment as unproved, and the liguistic identity of the Indus people as still a mystery, may note the following facts:
1. There is no tradition whatsoever among the Dravidian speaking populace of the South that they originally lived in the Northwest, or that their language and civilization extended to the Northwest, or that their language and civilization extended to the Northwest, or that they had a sister "Dravidian" civilization in the Northwest. The oldest Dravidian traditions speak of ancient prehistoric kingdoms in the South itself, extending, in fact, even further south into a land now sunk under the seas. There is no trace of Dravidian place names in the Indus region even in the very ancient past. "Excavation in the South has hitherto revealed no trace of the Indus Valley Civilization" (History and Culture of the Indian People, Vol.1, The Vedic Age, edited by R.C. Majumdar). There is no Dravidian tradition of any conflict with the speakers of Indo European languages in ancient times. That Tamil has the names Vadamoli (northern language) for Sanskrit and Tenmoli (southern language) for ancient Tamil is also significant.
2. Excavations at the Harappan sites have yielded many fire altars terracotta ladles as were used in yajnas, and (in some cases) pieces of bangles, pottery and animal bones in these altars (as in certain Vedic sacrifices). The book Lothal and the Indus Civilization by Dr SR Rao shows photographs of these altars (Plates XXXVI A-D and XXXVII A-B)
3. Anthropological study of the cephalic index of the skulls found on the sites at Harappa, Mohenjodaro and Lothal (situated in Punjab, Sind and Gujarat respec tively) reveals that the racial composition of each of these regions in Harappan times was more or less the same as it is now. Dr S.R. Rao points out: "So far as cephalic index is concerned, the Harappan people of Mohenjodaro have similarities with the present day people of Sind, those of Harappa with the people of Punjab and those of Lothal with the people of Gujarat."
The same has been described in detail by P. Gupta, P.C. Datta and A. Basu in Human Skeletal Remains from Harappa (Memoirs of the Anthropological Survey of India No.9, Calcutta, 1962), and they conclude that "the population of the widespread region (Punjab Gujarat) has remained more or less stable since Harappan times". This disproves the idea of displacement of an originally different "non Aryan" Harappan population by the present day "Aryan" inhabitants of this region.
So it is clear that the Harappans were Indo Europeans. But what exactly is their position in the ancient texts?
THE HARAPPANS IN THE ANCIENT TEXTS
The heyday of the Indus Civilization was after the composition of the major bulk of the Rigvedic hymns. Hence, there is no mention of any people in the Rigveda who may be identified as the Harappans.
According to the Puranas, the Purus (i.e. the Vedic Aryans) were in the Punjab region, but the center of their culture soon shifted eastwards to the region later known as the Kuru Panchala region and then they also expanded further east towards the south of the Iksvaku region and to the region of the earstwhile Pramsus. This, as any invasionist scholar will agree, is also demonstrated by the Vedic texts.
The Anus, on the other hand, originally lived in Kashmir, but they migrated southwards and established kingdoms in the Punjab. Continuing conflicts with the Purus probably led to their movement westwards.
The exact identity of the Indus people is, therefore, probably a mixture of Purus and Anus with perhaps also an element of Yadus. That they were not wholly Anus is proved by the fact that Rudra/Siva/Pasupati, the only known God, and obviously the most prominent one, of the Indus people, is not prominent in any Iranian culture; and the present day languages of Punjab and Sind are not Iranian, but "Indo Aryan". That they were not wholly Purus is proved by the fact that the Puru based Vedic texts do not give much importance to them.
Their exact chronological position vis-a-vis the Vedic culture is shown by a comparison of the Indian texts, which refer to these people, with the Sumerian texts which also refer to them. The Sumerians are known to have had trade relations with the Indus people, and the Sumerian texts have been reliably dated; hence this cross reference enables us to date the Vedic texts also.
We have already described (in an earlier chapter) the evidence furnished by KD Sethna whereby he dates the Rigveda prior to the Indus Civilization on the basis of two factors: the mention of cotton (karpAsa) in the Vedic texts; and the mention of Melukkha (which proves to the Indus Civilization) in the Sumerian texts collated with the mention of Mlecchadesa in the earliest sutras.
The evidence is too strong to be denied. But what makes it irresistable is the fact that even a determinedly invasionist scholar like Malati Shendge unwittingly corroborates KD Sethna's line of argument...
THE ORIGINAL HOMELAND
The history of the Indo European family of languages may thus be summarized as follows:
In ancient, prehistoric times, the distribution of the languages in India may have been roughly the same as it is today: viz. the Dravidian languages being spoken in the south, the Austric languages in the east, the Andamanese languages in the Andaman Islands, the Burushaski language in a part of Kashmir, the Sino Tibetan languages in the Himalayan and far eastern border areas, and the Indo European languages certainly in more or less their present habitat in most of northern India.
Among the speakers of Indo European languages, a great historical occurence took place when a major part of the Indo Europeans of south eastern Uttar pradesh migrated to the west and settled down in the northwestern areas Punjab, Kashmir and the further north west, where they differentiated into three groups: the Purus (in the punjab), the Anus (in Kashmir) and the Druhyus (in northwestern and Afghanistan). Meanwhile, there remained various Indo Europeans still in the interior of India: the Yadus in northern Maharashtra, Gujarat and Western UP; Iksvakus in northeastern UP (and perhaps also in Dakshina Kosala in eastern MP); and Pramsus in Bihar, to name only those of them clearly mentined and described in the Puranas.
The Purus developed the Vedic culture of the Punjab, while the other groups of Inner Indo Europeans (alongwith the Austric and Dravidian language speakers) developed other religious and cultural elements integral to Hinduism and Indian culture. Later, the Vedic culture of the Purus spread all over India and became the elite culture of Hinduism, while the Vedic languages, and the classical Sanskrit created from it (in combination with some Inner dialects) by the grammarians, strongly influenced all the Inner languages (Inner IndoEuropean, Austric and Dravidian).
Meanwhile, major sections of Anus spread out all over Western Asia and developed into the various Iranian cultures. The Druhyus spread out into Europe in two instalments: the speakers of the proto Germanic dialect first migrated northwards and then westwards, and then later the speakers of the protoHellenic and proto Italo Celtic dialects moved into Europe by a different, more southern, route.
It is possible that the speakers of proto Baltic and proto Slavonic (or proto Balto Slavonic) (who left earlier, perhaps in the first wave of migration alongwith the speakers of proto Germanic), and the speakers of proto Illyrian and proto Thraco Phrygian (who left later alongwith the later Druhyu groups and the Iranians) were Anus and not Druyus the Anus and Druhyus thus being, respectively, the speakers of proto Saten and proto Kentum.
The Indus Valley culture was a mixed culture of Purus and Anus; the Hittites and the Tocharians were probably different mixed groups of Purus, Anus and Druhyus. The Mitanni and Kassites were certainly groups of Vedic Purus.
The whole description is based on the most logical and in many respects the only possible, interpretation of the facts, which have already been described and analysed in detail throughout this book and need not be recapitulated.
Any further research, and any new material discovered on the subject, can only confirm this description. There may be minor points on which rectification may become necessary, such as on the exact identities and interrelationships of the various Indo European groups, past and present; but there is no possible way in which the location of the Original Homeland in the interior of northern India, so faithfully recorded in the Puranas and confirmed in the Rigveda, can ever be disproved.
REFERENCES
Back To Indus Valley Links
Back To Library Of Hindu History
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