Book review: The Lost River

How many times have we heard praises to the triumvirate of rivers - the Ganga, the Yamuna and the Sarasvati? While we know where the Ganga and Yamuna flow, we have been conventionally told that the Sarasvati is a mythical river that joins the Ganga and the Yamuna at the triveni sangam at Prayaag. However, for more than a century a debate has been raging, unknown to most layman in India, about the real truth of the Sarasvati.

'The Lost River' by Michel Danino explains the issues involved, the various viewpoints that exist and provides a beautiful narrative of the story of the Sarasvati. It is a good scholarly work, and an interesting read at the same time. A few questions that have been asked in the course of the debate, and I have tried to summarize them and the answers/viewpoints from the book's position on the issue :

• Is the river Sarasvati for real? 
• Where did it flow? Since the mid 19th century, a seasonal stream in Rajasthan's desert with an unusually wide bed, the Ghaggar-Hakra, has been postulated by many to be the lost Sarasvati river. The archaeological, literary, geological and local folklore evidence is very strong to suggest that there was indeed a very large perennial river flowing through the desert of Rajasthan and Pakistan. 

• The Ghaggar-Hakra may have been a large river in old times. But was it the Sarasvati? Again the circumstantial evidence is strong - mainly from our literary sources. The 'nadistuti hymn' from the Rg Veda enumerates the major rivers of Northwest India - the Sapta Sindu - in east to west direction; the Sarasvati lies exactly between the Satluj and the Yamuna, just like the Ghaggar-Hakra. Balarama's journey along the Saravati in the Mahabharata and the places he visits correspond to places in this region. 
• Over the last fifty years, the Ghaggar-Hakra basin has also seen the discovery of a large number of Indus valley civilization sites from Haryana to deserts of Cholistan in Pakistan.  This has led to the realization that the Indus Valley civilization was built around two major river systems, the Indus and the Sarasvati.  Some of the largest Indus valley sites like Kalibangan, Banawali, Rakhagarhi, Ganeriwala and Lothal are in the Sarasvati's basin. 
• What happened to the Sarasvati? The Sarasvati's major tributaries were the Himalayan rivers, the Satluj and the Yamuna; whereas traditionally the Sarasvati has itself been identified to originate from the Shivalik Hills at Ad Badri. At some point, the Yamuna and the Satluj changed courses, the Yamuna joining the Ganga and the Satluj joining the Indus thus depriving the Sarasvati of its major water sources. The Satluj is known to have a very volatile history of changing its course, the latest being somewhere in the 17th century. Some tectonic movements may also have contributed to these changes. 
• When did this drying take place? Studies show that the river was in full flow in around 3000 BC, but it had dried up in its central sections by around 2500 BC. That means in the Mature Harappan age, the river was already dry in some parts and this is clearly observable from the settlement pattern of Indus valley sites. Most sites during this period are either near the northern end in Haryana/Punjab or in the southern portions in Cholistan area of Pakistan. The sites in Rajasthan from the Early Harappan phase seem to have been abandoned by then. 
• What happened to the people in this region once the river died? Here is where the story gets even murkier and gets intertwined with the Aryan Invasion theory. Traditional history says that what followed was a dark period in the history of India till the Aryans from Europe invaded and settled in the Gangetic plains which evolved into the classical Indian civilization from which our present day civilization derives. The contention of many historians is that there is simply no archaeological or genetic evidence to support such a theory, whose only basis seems to be the need to explain the commonality in the Indo-European languages. The author argues for a strong continuity of our present day culture from the Indus valley civilization. As the river dried up, people migrated to the east settling in the Gangetic plains and carrying over their science and technology, architecture, religion and arts. A couple of chapters in the book are dedicated to exploring these connections and make for very interesting reading.

In addition to the debate on the Sarasvati, this book is also good material for anyone wanting to read on the Indus valley civilization. One part of the book is devoted to the Indus valley civilization, with one chapter on a few prominent Indus valley cities on the Sarasvati river. 

As a footnote, what is most depressing is that our history books make no mention of these facts. Why are these alternate views presented in our history books when the evidence for these theories too are not trivial at the least? Our history books too live either in Indus valley time or truly in Kaliyuga.  

Thanks to mankuthima for recommending this book, and you can find his summary of the book here:

• Sarasvati-The lost river - Part I
• Sarasvati-The lost river - Part II
• Sarasvati-The lost river - Part III

Breaking India - A review

Rajiv Malhotra and Aravindan Neelakandan's 'Breaking India - Western interventions in Dravidian and Dalit Faultlines' is a detailed work on much under-studied internal security challenge that India faces - "Dravidian and Dalit separatism being fostered by the West in the name of human rights".

The roots of this separatist thought go back to the colonial times, when the British for political reasons concocted the stories of Aryan and Dravidian races. Then Dravidians were made out to have a separate culture and religion historically, and they were shown to have been subjugated by the tyrannical Aryans and 'cunning' Brahmins. Thus Dravidians were made out to be the oppressed original inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent, who were assimilated into the Vedic culture. Tamil culture was made out to be the torchbearer of this alternative Dravidian culture. Such interpretations were drawn through malicious interpretation of Vedic literature. I am simplifying the story, which is always a dangerous thing to do with history. But the authors have presented a good history of how the alternative identify was created.

This has already caused us national integration problems in the past with the rabid Dravidian political forces in Tamil Nadu. However, that Dravidian movement has lost steam - but not the idea. In fact, trouble is still being brewed up by a group of western think-tanks, academic circles - probably with tacit support from elements in the Western establishment. Add to this the extreme Christian evangelicals who see India as the next big target for evangelicism. They have a vested interest in dividing up Indian communities so as to make them more amenable to conversion. The route they take is to first delink communities from a larger Indian civilization , by promoting divides like the Aryan-Dravidian divide. This sets the stage for missionary activity. However, to convert a community there needs to be a cultural connect that Christianity has to make with them. There is an effort to do the same with Dravidian identity. First, Tamil spiritual works like 'Shaiva Siddhanta' and 'Thirukural' are proclaimed to be non-Vedic in identity. All the good in the Tamil culture was ascribed to these works whereas all the bad was ascribed to the Vedic literature. Then mischievous mappings were done from the Tamil works to the Bible and Christian theology, to show how they derive from the Bible and is thus an impure form of Christianity (Dravidian Christianity). For this the story of St. Thomas visiting India and his persecution has been accepted as fact without verification, and additional embellishments were done on top of that - like claiming that all the Tamil works originate from the teachings of St. Thomas. Now, the stage is set for evangelism, and indeed a lot of NGOs and activists have been co-opted by the evangelicals. It is said that among some communities the conversions are being done at a rapid rate, and this is causing social tensions. The authors elaborate on these issues and provide insightful instances.

In a similar way, the Dalit identity has also been forged and sought to be separated from the Indian civilization. As the authors mention, Westerners have attempted to foster such ethnic divisions in other parts of the world (Rwanda, Sri Lanka), and the results have been disastrous for the people. Wasn't the Indian Partition also a result of such a divide-and-rule policy? They caution that we should maintain our vigil against such attempts at social engineering by a these trouble-mongers.

The book is a work of great detail running into 600 pages, including 200 pages of appendices, notes and references. However, the basic idea is essentially what has been mentioned above. The authors have of course argued their ideas and presented an analysis in a much better way than what this little post can do, and have given extensive examples and instances. It is generally said that history is written by the victor, and hence its always a refreshing change to learn another perspective and then to draw your own conclusions.

Book Review: The Lady Tasting Tea

A lady claims that the taste of tea differs when milk is poured to tea leaves as opposed to adding tea leaves into a cup of milk. Everyone at the small party scoffs at the suggestion, except Ronald Aylmer Fisher. Fisher designs an experiment that would statistically establish the lady's claims. He creates a sample set containing tea prepared in either ways, and lo and behold - the story goes that the lady identifies each cup correctly. Fisher uses this example to explain the design of experiments in his book 'The Design of Experiments'. This anecdote sets up the book. 'The Lady Tasting Tea' is the story of the development of statistics, Fisher having built the pillars of statistics as it stands today.

I started reading this book, while looking around to brush my statistics; thought it would be a good idea to know the history of the subject I am exploring. That's particularly relevant in sciences filled with uncertainties like statistics, economics, linguistics; where the characteristics of the individual seem to contribute to the development of the theory, and there's a story behind things which seem arbitrary.

David Salsburg takes us through an entertaining journey starting with the earliest breakthroughs by Karl Pearson and William Gossett, going to the pioneering foundational works of the acerbic genius Ronald Fisher, the cheerful Jerzy Newman, and the multitalented Andrei Kolmogorov. Apart from these pioneers, Salsburg very vividly sketches the lives and contributions of Egon Pearson (hypothesis testing), Chester Bliss (probit analysis), John Tukey (exploratory data analysis), Frank Wilcoxon (non-parametric methods), EJG Pitman (non-parametric methods), Prasanta Chandra Mahalabonis (sampling theory), Samuel Wilks (Founder - Statistical Research Group, Princeton) , George Box (robust statistics) and Edward Deming (statistical quality control).

Some of the chapter names are interesting, and they are as good as the title of the book. It reminds me of 'The Mythical Man Month''s memorable illustrative sketches. Sample this:

• The Mozart of Mathematics - Andrei Kolmorogov
• The Picasso of Statistics - John Tukey
• The March of the Martingales - on the work of Paul Levy

Read this if you are a fan of scientific history.