In an article about the appointment of Yellapragada Sudarshan Rao, as head of the Indian Council of Historical Research, Mihir S Sharma writes the following in Business Standard (BS)
They argue that the earlier Vedas, which the Marxist-Missionary nexus describes as being from a pastoral society, were actually written in the Indus Valley Civilisation – sorry, the Saraswati Valley Civilisation. It provides conclusive proof, in the unquestionably Indic form of frequent assertion, that it was from India that the Aryans spread out to Iran, Central Asia, and finally Europe. Such claims are looked down on by evangelical Christian CIA agents like Chicago’s Caroline E Haskell Distinguished Service Professor of the History of Religions Bruce Lincoln, who describes them as “exercises in scholarship (= myth + footnotes)”. Eh, but what does he know.[Eminently funny historians]
The usage of the word Sarasvati Valley in this context is used to imply that it is a ridiculous terminology used only by people who support people like Mr. Rao about whom no one has heard of. I have no idea who this Mr. Rao is and do not wish to defend him or whatever he stands for.
There is something about the word Sarasvati Valley Civilisation though. That is not a terminology scholars use. A more popular use is Indus-Sarasvati civilisation based on evidence that most sites of the Harappan civilisation lie along the path of the non-mythical Sarasvati river. If this is a conspiracy, then there are many scholars in that list. Michel Danino writes about the use of this terminology and names the main culprits.
First, let us note that a few dailies, while reporting the Minister’s statement, rushed to stick the label “mythical” to the Saraswati river, parroting the Leftist historians who, since the mid-1980s have objected to any attempt to identify the Saraswati of the Rig-Veda with a real river within India’s geography (their objection would have been dropped if it was located in, say, Afghanistan). These historians and their followers in the media do not seem to know that the bed of the Ghaggar river running through Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan and on to Cholistan (where it is known as “Hakra”) has been identified with the Vedic Saraswati since 1855 by generations of geologists, geographers, Indologists, archaeologists and remote sensing experts. They are too numerous to list here, but among them are F Max Müller, HH Wilson, RD Oldham, CF Oldham, Marc Aurel Stein, Louis Renou, Herbert Wilhelmy, Mortimer Wheeler, Raymond Allchin, Jonathan M. Kenoyer, Gregory Possehl…. This is also not the place to go into the arguments favouring this identification, but let me briefly recall that they include, first, the Rig-Veda’s description of the Saraswati as flowing “from the mountain to the sea”; second, the text’s specific mention of the river between the Yamuna and the Sutlej; and third, the existence of a small “Sarsuti” stream as a tributary of the Ghaggar. Indeed, a number of British maps, right from 1760 noted the Ghaggar-Saraswati association.[Saraswati, Ganga, and India’s vanishing rivers]
It is really puzzling to note that why people are so aghast at anti ARYAN THEORY. Let us not bother about Indus Saraswsthi civilization. But popnents of AIT should answer the following questions: If Info Aryans are not older than 2500. BC how is that recent excavations at Turkey brought forth a bronze statue with tuft in the shape of head plate similar to Greeks seven thousand years old? In Great Britain objects of more than 3000 years old are being scattered. Whether Celts/Iberians/Druids are less than 1500BC then whether Celts/Iberians/Druids are Info Europeans or not? The Ionians are more than three thousand years old. Ancient Greek historians themselves admit that there was dark period in Greek — end of Ionian age in 1800BC to 800 BC the commencing of hellinic civilization? How is that RamsesI/II entered into alliance with Hittites around 2300 BC if they are barbarians? How is that their cousins– Hurrites/Kassites/Medes/Lydians were advanced even before Indo Aryans? Or only those Aryans who entered India alone were barbarians? If they were barbarians who gave them chariots? From whom they got the language which is unparalleled? Why didn’t they use either hieroglyphics/cuneiform though their cousins Hittites/Hurrites/Kassites used it? Did they enter India with tuft or not? If they entered with tuft why did Vedic Rishis are always shown with matted hair and beard? Why did not a single Vedic God have tuft? When did they change the habit of burying the dead with burning?Who introduced elephant corps which was used only in India since Aryans did not know elephants? How did vedic language disappeared? Who introduced sacrifices like Aswamedha/Rajasuya performed only by kings? How did kings disappear since Jainism is the oldest religion and during Mahavira’ s time there were only janapadas? How did South Indian kings from Satavahanas to Tamil kings boasted of performing Aswamedha etc., when it was not such a practice in north but for Sungas and Guptas? How is that there was not even an iota of immigration in large scale of North India during Islamic invasions but for claim of Gauda Saraswatha Brahmins? Just as Indus civilization is fake so also Aryan theory– the greatest intellectual fraud of humanity! You cannot have two standards– Indo Aryans are barbarians are not o!der than 1500BC but practicing everything opposite to other Indo Europeans who buried their dead/adopted Hieroglyphics/cuneiform/did not know using elephant corps.
Tamilkelvan, you are one intelligent reader. The revisionists cannot pull the wool over your eyes. They say there was no invasion, but there are other invasions in other parts of the world. But not in India. They say that the Indus is Aryan but if that is so the seals has proven to be un Aryan and undeceiphered. They forged the signature form of the horse in their rash efforts to prove that it is Aryan. These people are sick. Their Indus civilization is brimming with millions of graves with their occupation of inhumation instead of cremation, yet they include the huge cultural civilization as Aryan. They had no mythology of the horse yet their writers convince foolish readers that this is so. Something is definitely wrong with the intelligence of these historians , they are arguing about things that was never was and things that never could be. Why is it that they want to show that the IVC is Aryan and deny the Aryan contribution to India? Can anyone show me any horses galloping on the streets of the Indus? All I can see is the Revisionists with their asses.