Caste: the new civil conflict in India

PartII: The Saraswati river.

The Aryans left behind a rich oral tradition, in which sacred texts were committed to memory and passed down from generation to generation.Considering the time elapsed since these texts, in the form of hymns or "Shlokas" (couplets) were composed, there is a remarkably little difference between different versions extant in the various corners of India.

The Rig Veda, widely held to be one of the earliest of the texts, speaks of the "Sapta Sindhu", the seven great rivers which formed the backbone of civilization at the time.I give below the Vedic names together with the corresponding modern names:

 Vedic                              Modern
 Sindhu                                Indus
 Vitasta                               Jhelum
 Asikini or Chandrabhaga               Chenab
 Parushini or Iravati                  Ravi
 Vipasa                                Beas
 Shatadru                              Sutlej
 Saraswati                               ?

Of the rivers mentioned in the Rig Veda, Saraswati was held to be the mightiest: yet it seems to have disappeared, while all the others survive.

Modern geographical evidence, together with the data collected from remote satellites, suggest the following turbulent history:

As late as only ten thousand years ago, the glaciers in the Himalayas started thawing, releasing great amounts of water, the major part of which flowed across the Indian sub-continent into the sea.The Indus, Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi and Beas formed one such river valley, the Sutlej, Saraswati, Drishadvati and the Yamuna formed another, with the Ganges and its tributaries forming a third. Flush with copious fresh water, fertile plains grew up around these rivers, and the Saraswati and the Indus systems formed the basis for the flourishing Harappan civilization.

Geological upheavals continued in this historically ancient but geographically young area. Tectonic upheavals in the Himalayas some 4000 years ago. cut off the glacial supply of water to the Saraswati: upheavals downstream caused the Sutlej to break away, changing its course to meet the Beas in the west, and the Yamuna to flow to the Ganges to the East. The Saraswati, now called the Ghaggar is now a rain-fed river, surviving around 300 miles before emptying itself into the Thar desert.Along with the river, the civilization that grew up around it also disappeared. Read Saswati Paik's article for an interesting account.

Caste: the new civil conflict in India

Part I:The background.

The resolution of civil conflict is an important ingredient of nation-building. India, despite its sixty years of independence and an age-old hi story, is still a nation in the making.

Ethnic, religious and linguistic differences apart, caste has emerged as the latest of the divisive issues that need an equitable resolution. So much disinformation exists on the subject, that I would like to present my views on the political and economic aspects by starting at the beginning: ancient Indian civilization.

The ancient river valley civilizations of the Tigris-Euphrates in Iraq, the Nile in Egypt and the Sindhu (miscalled the 'Indus' by the Greeks) in Pakistan together form what is possibly the basic underpinning of European civilization and culture as we know it.The first two are well researched and documented; the third ,which was also the largest, has great areas obscured in shadow. Visit this website for a fascinating account.

Part of the problem is that there were not one, but two separate 'ancient civilizations' on the banks of the Indus (I bow to modernity while using this name). The earlier, or 'Harappan' civilization flourished probably around 2500 BC.

The Harappans left behind astonishingly well-constructed and laid-out cities complete with buildings ,baths, walls and drains. There is evidence (corroborated with archaeological records in Iraq) of extensive maritime trade conducted by the major port cities:Harappa and Mohenjo-daro.The Harappans wrote: there is an abundance of terra cotta seals bearing inscriptions which have not been deciphered even today.In addition to script, there is an abundance of well-crafted animal figures, of which the bull and the "unicorn" were in plenty.( When I look at a picture of a "unicorn" sculpted in bas-relief on a seal, it suggests a view of a species of long-horned cattle, used, perhaps for religious or sacrificial purposes.

The Aryans, who entered the Indian sub-continent around 1500 B.C. were a completely different people.They had no urban tradition, did not build, so left no archaeological evidence.They did not write.The animal they spoke of was the horse, and they referred to chariots.They seem to have been basically rural people, much less advanced, it would appear, than the Harappans.Yet they left behind a rich oral tradition in language, religion ,music , philosophy, mathematics and science that persists in India to this day.

The puzzle for me is: why did the Harappan (or "Indus Valley") language die out without any trace? What happened to the Harappan people?Why did such a flourishing civilization disappear?Why are their traditions not entwined in the legends of contemporary India like those of the Aryans?

Historians discount the factor of war with the invading Aryans as a reason, because, for one thing, in the rich Aryan literature that remains with us till this day, there is no account of any war with established urban populations.A stronger evidence arises from the fact that the Harappan civilization appears to have covered more than a million square kilometers in its heyday, extending from Afghanistan in the North, and covering the whole of Pakistan and the northern and western Indian states of Punjab,Haryana,Rajastahan, and Gujarat. There was no one kingdom: there appear to have been many "janapadas" or small republics that constituted this civlization.It was never going to be easy for a small group of invaders to subjugate this region within a short time.

I will cover a resume of existing evidence and speculation in my next post.