Indology

It was in 1993 that Prof. Behari Chaubey explained in detail the difficulties appearing in Vedic Studies in the modern conditions of India. There was a shrinking number of scholars and a deterioration of the quality of Vedic Studies. Vedic was hardly taught in the Universities and research was of very low quality.

And first, let me say that Koenraad Elst is a most admirable scholar, a polyglot of very wide reading. But his most admirable and distinguishing feature is that he, before me, went against the grain of mainstream theories pertaining to the origins and dates of the Old Indic or Vedic Culture. This must have been more difficult for him than me, since it posed grave impediments for an academic career in the West – something that never bothered me…

The 7 types of Aorist in Sanskrit furnish additional clear evidence for its antiquity and special status among Indo-European tongues. Comparison with Greek aorists show that the Sanskrit types are inherent, not innovations as most scholars believe. But we are left with the difficult question “Why have so many different types when there is no apparent difference in semantic function?”

In this paper, I propose to critique the conventional view of the Rgveda as a text constantly praising Vedic gods and their horse and chariot driven “Aryan” allies for waging war against “black-skinned” autochthons ensconsed in their forts, in effect reading into theRgveda a glorified account of the Aryan’s military conquest of native north-west India.

In this paper it is argued that there are enough parallels between Orpheus, the Vedic Ribhus and Germanic Elves to regard Orpheus an IndoEuropean figure.

In this paper are assembled all the archaeological, genetic, (many) linguistic, literary and palaeoastronomical evidences, showing that the Indoaryans did not enter the Saptasindhu area, which is now N-Western India and Pakistan, in the 2nd millennium, as mainstream dogma has it. They were there from a much earlier undetermined period; the Rigveda was completed at the latest in the mid-fourth millennium, well before the rise of the Mature Harappan culture.

The importance of the Rigveda is first of all national, relating to India itself and then universal, relating to all humans. The RV saṃhitā tells us a lot about the origin and nature of the ancient Bhāratas. Moreover, all Indian culture, philosophical and religious traditions stem from the RV. Then it tells us a lot about the nature and aspirations of the human being.
WAVES (Wider Association of Vedic Studies) Teleconference with Prof. N. Kazanas (14/3/2021)

In this paper N. Kazanas examines briefly the real situation regarding the religiophilosophical frame of belief in Ancient India and particularly in the Vedic period. While undoubtedly the worship of many different, as it seems, gods was paramount in the Rigvedic hymns, yet some of those hymns reveal a firm faith in the One Absolute of which the many are manifestations. A little deeper enquiry into the hymns and the Upanishads subsequently reveals that a philosophy like that of Adi Shankara’s Vedanta was already in full operation beside the worship of the many, the sacrificial rituals and all the other religious practices of that period.
In the Beginning has been published in 2016 in indiafacts.org, a platform for serious enquiry and discussion on dharma, comparative religion, cross-civilizational issues, Indology, and India-related topics. It will also be published in Journal of Vedic Studies, Ravindra Bharati University, Kolkata.

Western scholars like to speculate and so import speculation even in places where none exists. Almost all who have dealt with the early aspect of Indian philosophy, say from the RV (Rgveda) to the Upanishads, write of “Hindu philosophical speculation.” But a careful examination of the RV and the early Upanishads shows very little speculation. On the contrary, the texts evidently arise from and describe first-hand experience – except where the poet-seers indulge in playful metaphors, tropes and verbal games like riddles. In the Beginning 2 : Speculation? has been published in 2016 in indiafacts.org , a platform for serious enquiry and discussion on dharma, comparative religion, cross-civilizational issues, Indology, and India-related topics. It will also be published in Journal of Vedic Studies, Ravindra Bharati University, Kolkata.

Contrary to modern mainstream belief that religiophilosophical beliefs developed from primitive crude ritualistic nature-worship and/or animism to polytheism, henotheism, monotheism (a Sky-father-god or Mother-goddess) then monism, this paper argues that in the RV (Rgveda) the opposite is true. Some rigvedic sages knew that all forms of divine power and all manifestations are expressions of One Supreme Being, neither male nor female and from this descended or developed other forms of philosophy, religion, ritual, myth and superstition. In the Beginning 3: One or many… has been published in 2016 in indiafacts.org , a platform for serious enquiry and discussion on dharma, comparative religion, cross-civilizational issues, Indology, and India-related topics. It will also be published in Journal of Vedic Studies, Ravindra Bharati University, Kolkata.

It is almost universally assumed that religion began with animistic beliefs and practices and/or the attribution of divine powers to natural forces (lightning, wind etc). It is also assumed generally that shamans through ingestion of substances and/or dancing achieve higher states of consciousness and greater powers. All such notions are derived from the assumptions of early anthropologists that certain peoples they met are “primitive” and that it is from their beliefs and practices that modern religions arose. The Rgveda provides altogether different evidences that refute these assumptions. In its hymns all deities are said to be expressions of The One and higher states could be achieved through specific practices, meditation and ethical behaviour. So called primitives may well be devolving or degenerate forms of former advanced peoples.
It was first published in Kazanas 2015, Vedic and Indo European Studies, New Delhi, Aditya Prakashan.

Contrary to the widely held beliefs that in its origin religion had many gods (polytheism) or a supreme male god or the worship of a female (Mother) Goddess, this paper argues with much evidence that the original state probably was one in which all deities are expressions of a Primal Power, itself unmanifest and being neither male nor female.
Published in 2015 in Vedic and Indo-Europeans Studies, by N Kazanas, N. Delhi, Aditya Prakashan.

Sanskrit alone has dhatus or roots in an absolute sense. This fact and the accompanying complex morphology of Sanskrit show that language (human speech in general) started as a highly synthetic phenomenon. With the passage of millennia it gradually devolved into a simpler morphology and many descendants. Within this larger movement of decay several tongues moved from a rather fixed syntactic isolating status back to a fusional condition with new complex morphology (e.g. Coptic from Old Egyptian, Modern from Old Hungarian, etc.). These are smaller segments of cycles within the larger descending spiral. An examination of several nominal and verbal endings in Sanskrit and Proto-Indo-European shows that these endings do not come from original pronouns, pre- or post-positions and similar morphemes.
How did language begin? How and why does it change?
Published in 2015 in Vedic and Indo-European Studies, by N. Kazanas, N. Delhi, Aditya Prakashan.

“Economic Principles in the Vedic Tradition” by N. Kazanas has been published in 1992 by Aditya Prakashan, www.adityaprakashan.com.
The paper deals with economic principles as found in the more ancient sources of the Vedic period in so far as this is possible. Unlike a particular application of a law which may well be affected by circumstances and thus appear to be different from place to place and time to time, a principle has an unchanging, universal quality. Despite few economic terms used throughout the text like Land Value Taxation (which means simply taxing the value of land alone) there is nothing complex or complicated in this study and reading it does not require any training in Economics. By showing the relation of the Indic principles to certain modern concepts and particularly to Land Value Taxation the paper goes a long way in bringing into light many valuable economic concepts and practices supported by an institutional framework.

Thus we meet the same concern about the distribution of wealth that occupies the mind of modern economists. How much does a man or a family need to earn and how much should be given to the royal treasury (i.e. the State) and how should these be determined? Or to put it in other terms, how should taxation be levied? Then, how should the State dispose of its revenue? Also, how should lending operate and what would be fair rates of interest? The lawgivers in ancient India were fully aware of all these issues. One aspect of modern economies that is not treated by the ancients is unemployment because this problem appeared as such, on a large scale, only with the increase of population, the land enclosures (=privatization) and the industrial revolution in Europe at the end of the 18th century. But the texts take it for granted that people should feel secure in their different employments. A most surprising feature is the principles of free access to land for all and the Land Value Tax which should be the source of Government revenue (and expenditure). It is surprising because Land Value Taxation is supposed to be a fairly modern concept.

This paper examines many parallels in the archaic Greek culture and the Vedic one. These are themes, poetic techniques, motifs and ideas in literature, mythology, philosophy, religion and ritual. For example, it is obvious that the names Zeus (Gr) and Dyaus (Vedic) are closely related. As in Greek mythology there is dog Kerberos guarding the entrance to Hades, so in the Vedic myths there are two dogs watching the path to Yama’s netherworld. Many of these parallels have affinities with similar motifs in other Indo-european cultures like Celtic, Germanic and so on. Most classicists ignore these affinities or similarities and claim ( as W. Burkert does extensively) that many such elements in the Greek culture derive from Near-eastern sources. Thus Burkert thinks that the practice in Greece of having a young man or a seer sprinkling with a branch of laurel or tamarisk a polluted person or place came from Mesopotamia. However, the same practice is found in early Vedic texts where an apamarga branch is used. Consequently this paper argues with many examples that where such motifs and practices in Greece are found in the Vedic and other Indo-european cultures, they are most probably inherited forms from the Proto-Indo-European period before the dispersal of the various branches.

In this essay the author examines independent linguistic evidence, often provided by iranianists like R. Beekes, and arrives at the conclusion that the Avesta, even its older parts (the gaθas), is much later than the Rigveda. Also, of course, that Vedic is more archaic than Avestan and that it was not the Indoaryans who moved away from the common Indo-Iranian habitat into the Region of the Seven Rivers, but the Iranians broke off and eventually settled and spread in ancient Iran.
Vedic and Avestan was first published in Vedic Venues: Journal of the Continuity of Vedic Culture 2012, vol 1, published by Aditya Prakashan for the Kothari Charity Trust.

The Rigveda contains and seems to preserve more common elements from the Proto-Indo-European Culture than any other branch of the family. This essay examines various points of language, poetry and philosophy but it focuses mainly on grammatical elements, lexical and syntactical, and on aspects of (fine) poetry. This is one aspect showing that Vedic and its culture is much closer to the PIE language and culture than any other branch in that family. Moreover, it shows that it is most unlikely that Vedic moved across thousands of miles over difficult terrains to come to rest in what is today N-W India and Pakistan, in Saptasindhu or the Land of the Seven Rivers. Certain other aspects show that Iranian moved away from Vedic and Saptasindhu and most probably the other branches did the same at a very distant but undetermined period. Finally, monotheism is also a notable feature in the RV despite its pronounced polytheism.
The article has already been presented in two Conferences in India and will be published in the book Perspectives on Origin of Indian Civilization edited by Angela Marcantonio & Girish Nath Jha in association with the Center for Indic Studies, Dartmouth (USA).

The Vedic Venues: Journal of the Continuity of Vedic Culture is a new peer-reviewed Journal in english language that will be launched in December 2011. In the pdf file ‘Vedic Venues General Notification’ one can read: a) The list of the Editors and members of the Editorial Board; b) Instuctions for the presentation of articles for publication; c) The various subjects and themes suggested for research.

Here is Prof K.S. Valdiya’s response to the comments made in ‘In Indus Times, the River didn’t Run Through It‘ by Lawler, Science 1 April 2011

An International Seminar on “How deep are the Roots of Indian Civilization: an Archaeological and Historical Perspective” was held in New Delhi during 25-27 November 2010. Eminent archaeologists and other scholars attended the Seminar.
Dr M. Witzel misrepresents this event in his usual insulting way with the comments he posts in the group: Indo-Eurasian_Research. Here Dr Kazanas replies to him.

The pdf N. Kazanas-S. Talageri Correspondence has been written by N. Kazanas, in May 2010, after S. Talageri had made (in his book The Rigveda and the Avesta: Final Evidence, Delhi, ed. Aditya) several non-factual remarks about him.

N. Kazanas writes: “I thought I should make available all our exchanges which began in late February 2005 and ended in early May 2005. Thus, interested parties can, if they have the stamina to read through these turgid pages, decide for themselves whether or not I made “unreasonable remarks”, used “Witzellian thrusts”, “pounced” upon some point of his, “parodied” his reasoning, or I am “awake but pretend to be asleep” and so remain impervious to T’s efforts to wake me up. These are his own statements in the Preface (pp XX-XXII, XXXI) to his 2008 book, The Rigveda and the Avesta: Final Evidence (Delhi, Aditya). I have only just (May 2010) read these pages, not the book, having obtained a copy in April.”

In the pdf Correspondence Archive one can read all the correspondence which took place between S. Talageri and N. Kazanas during the period February-May 2005.

This paper was written earlier this year by Dr N Kazanas to correct some violations (or errors) of scholarship by Mrs. Karen Thomson in an article published in The Journal of IndoEuropean Studies 2009; Dr Kazanas paper has just been published in the same Journal, the issue of Dec 2010. With it is published Mrs. Thomson’s reply, ‘The plight of the Rigveda in the twenty-first century‘. At the end of the original paper Dr Kazanas now adds some comments which were not included in the published paper so as not to make it too bulky – §§8-10.

The essay Indo-European Linguistics and Indo-Aryan Indigenism is included in the book Indo-Aryan Origins and other Vedic Issues written by N. Kazanas, ed. Aditya Prakashan, Dec 2009, N. Delhi. It examines the general IE issue and argues in favour of Indoaryan indigenism against the AIT (Aryan Invasion/Immigration Theory) which has been mainstream doctrine for more than a century. The extreme positions that there was no PIE(=Proto-Indo-European) language or that this language is as currently reconstructed are refuted: the evidence suggests there was a PIE language but this cannot be reconstructed and all efforts in this reconstruction are misplaced. Since they are in no way verifiable, they should not be used as evidence for historical events. It is admitted even by rabid Indian nationalists that humans came to India from Africa sometime in the Pleistocene, and now there is evidence of change in the skeletal record of the region indicating that a new people may have entered c 6000-4500; even so, if these people were the IAs(=Indoaryans), they must, surely, be regarded as indigenous by 1700. Recent genetic studies do not suggest any entry of IAs within the last 10 000 years but state that the European peoples came out of South Asia after 50 000 B(efore)P(resent). Apart from such studies, other kinds of evidence and arguments will be used in full to demonstrate indigenism.

An additional piece by way of explanation for some points raised by readers of the ‘Open Letter to Prof. Witzel’. (Updated on 7 March 2010 due to a minor correction.)

Α new book by N. Kazanas has been published in December 2009 by Aditya Prakashan, N. Delhi with the title: Indo Aryan Origins and other Vedic Issues. Prof. Michael Witzel made some comments on this book in Yahoo Groups – Indo-Eurasian_research. Dr Kazanas replies with the Open Letter to Prof M. Witzel.

The Mainstream Model, written by N.Kazanas, is a thoroughly revised and recast version of a paper, ‘The Establishing of a View’, published in ABORI, 2003. It analyses the forces that go into the establishment of the mainstream view and examines some examples in the sciences where the Establishment strongly resists changes in the received dogmas. This was revised and expanded considerably and published in the Research Bulletin of the Vishverananda Vedic Research Institute (Hoshiarpur), 2008.

In February 2009 there was a Conference at Los Angeles at Loyolla Marymount University
on the subject of Sindhu Sarasvati Valley Civilization and its relation to the RigVeda. Several scholars from different countries and academic Institutions participated and gave talks on different aspects of this subject. When it was finished Dr Steve Farmer a collaborator of Prof Witzel at Harvard published the following scurrilous letter on the Indo-Eurasian list. Prof Ashok Aklujkar replied to this. Here are both letters.

This paper was presented synoptically by Dr N. Kazanas at the Conference THE SINDHU-SARASVATI VALLEY CIVILIZATION: A REAPPRAISAL, in Los Angeles (Feb 2009).
Argument: There are misconceptions about rigvedic pur, ratha and samudra based on the Aryan Invasion/Immigration myth. Then, there are some 10 characteristic features of the Sarasvati-Sindhu Culture which are not found in the Rig Veda. Moreover palaeoastronomical evidence (mainly N. Achar’s work) places some BrAhmaNa texts c 3000 and the oldest layers of the MahAbhArata 3067. All this (and more) suggests that the (bulk of the) Rig Vedashould be assigned to well before 3200 BCE – however unpalatable to mainstream thought this may be.

This paper examines the latest genetic evidence which shows that there was no invasion or immigration into N-W India in significant numbers before 600 BCE. It was published in Puratattva, Bulletin of the Indian Archaeological Society, New Delhi, No. 36, 2005-06, pp. 146-154.

This paper examines the latest evidence and shows that the horse was known and present in the Indus-Saraswati Culture in the mid-third millennium BCE and therefore was not brought by the hypothetical invasion/immigration of the Indoaryans into India c 1500 BCE.

This paper examines in detail the various aspects of the theory that the Dravidian speakers were once inhabitants of N.W. India and were ousted by incoming Indoaryans; it shows that this theory is mere fantasy belonging to the legacy of distorting colonial (British) thinking, since no linguistic, archaeological, anthropological and genetic types of evidence support it. (Paper presented at the International symposium on Indus Civilization and Tamil Language 2007.)

This paper presents ample evidence from archaeology, numismatics and, chiefly, literary sciences (the Sangam literature) in the South, that the Tamil culture is infused through & through by Vedic, Sanskrit epic and puranic elements; the term Dravidian should be understood as geographic, indicating South India and linguistic, indicating the non-Sanskritic languages. (Written in 2001, due to be pubilshed (2008) in Saundaryashrih: Archaeological Studies in the New Millenium: Festschrift to Prof. Anantha Adiga Sundara.)

In this paper I examine some legends of archaic Greek literature (texts ascribed to Homer and Hesiod) and their relationship to the Indian epic Mahaabhaarata (MB, hereafter). One is the parallel of Penelope’s archery contest, set for her suitors (Odyssey 19, 171ff) and Draupadi’s svayam-vara ‘choice of husband’, which also entails an archery contest (MB I, 175-180); the parallels of Damayanti’s svayam-varas in the story of Nala (MB III, 50-55 and 68) will also be discussed. A second parallel will be the Peleus-Thetis marriage in the Iliad and subsequent sources and that of Santanu-Gangaa (MB I, 91-3). A third parallel is the Five Races in Hesiod’ s Works and Days 109-201 and the Four Ages or Yugas in MB III, 148 and 186-9. Another parallel is that of Dionysus being born out of Zeus’s thigh (GM 1: 56) and of Aurva springing out of his mother’s thigh (MB I, 169-71).
These parallels have been noted and discussed in the past from different viewpoints. I believe they deserve another close look which reveals two things. First, a consideration of the probable dates of composition of the Greek poems and of the Indian epic shows that these tales are independent, involving no borrowing by one culture from the other; they are therefore of common IE origin. Second, such considerations highlight the need for revision of the chronology of ancient Indian texts and the fact that the MB contains considerable early material; this material consists of myths current in the Vedic period but only briefly or sporadically referred to by the Vedic texts. Much, if not most, of the MB seems to be much older than is generally thought, even though, in its present form it was written down perhaps in the third or second century BCE – and some sections even later.

This paper was published in the Journal of IndoEuropean Studies 2001. In this paper are examined the names of various deities that appear in two or more branches of the Indo-European family. The examination shows that the Rigveda contains more of these deities than any other branch of mythology. The elements examined are the names of certain deities which appear in two or more branches and are demonstrably not borrowings of one from another at some later period. We concentrate on names of deities because these indicate immediate correlation and provide a firm criterion for the common origin. Interpretation and speculation are kept to the barest minimum. The IE branches to be examined are Vedic, Avestan, Hittite, Greek, Roman, Slavonic, Baltic, Germanic and Celtic; also some additional evidence from the Mitanni and the Kassites in the Near East. The Germanic branch comprises some early Germanic material (reported by Roman authors), some Anglo-Saxon and the later, richer Scandinavian lore. The Celtic branch consists of early Gallic (again reported mainly by Romans), Britannic, Welsh and Irish. (Other IE branches like Armenian, Tocharian, etc, provide negligible relevant material.)

This paper examines the general IndoEuropean issue and argues in favour of Indoaryan indigenism against the AIT (Aryan Invasion/Immigration Theory) which has been mainstream doctrine for more than a century. The extreme positions that there was no ProtoIndoEuropean (PIE) language or that this language is as currently reconstructed are refuted: the evidence suggests there was a PIE language but this cannot be reconstructed and all efforts and confidence in this reconstruction are misplaced. Indeed, all reconstructions of Proto-languages seem futile and, since they are in no way verifiable, should not be used as evidence for historical events. Indeed all the data used as evidence by the AIT are wholly conjectural and arbitrary and often consist of misrepresentations and distortions, as will be clearly demonstrated in detail. All the arguments used for the AIT have been analytically presented by E. Bryant (2001) and summed up in his concluding chapter. These will be examined one by one and shown to be fallacious. We shall also refer to some material not in Bryant – e.g. genetic studies after 2001CE and mythological motifs never examined in this connection.

In this paper I argue that the IndoAryans (IA hereafter) are indigenous from at least 4500 (all dates are BCE except when otherwise stated) and possibly 7000. In this effort are utilized the latest archaeological finds and data from Archaeoastronomy, Anthropology and Palaeontology. I use in addition neglected cultural and linguistic evidence. I find no evidence at all for an invasion. The new term “migration” is a misnomer since a migration could not have produced the results found in that area. The Rigveda (=RV) is neither post-Harappan nor contemporaneous with the ISC but much earlier, ie from the 4th millennium (with minor exceptions) and perhaps before.
The bibliography of this study is available as a separate pdf file.
This paper was published in the Journal of IndoEuropean Studies 2002.

This paper presents evidence that man’s highest good, the shreyas, as taught by the Bhagavad Gitaa and the Upanishads, the aatmajNaana ‘Self-knowledge’, brahmajNaana‘knowledge of the Absolute’, moksha ‘liberation’ of the Vedaanta and related themes, are already present in the RV (=Rigveda), not just as spermatic ideas but very fully. Only the terminology differs.
This paper was published in 2005 in D.P. Chattopadhyaya (ed) Self, Society and Science…PHISPC, Centre for Studies in Civilizations, N. Delhi.

The Hindu printed in several issues (18th, 25th June, etc, 2002) letters from Dr D. Frawley and Prof M.Witzel amounting to a controversy whether the rigvedic people had towns/forts and knew the ocean; also whether the river SarasvatI flowed down to the ocean. I sent a letter to that newspaper in mid-September 2002 giving my own views, but for unknown reasons my letter was not published. I have since revised the whole piece. Here I show that samudra does denote the ocean/sea and that SarasvatI did flow to the ocean prior to 3200 BC.
This paper was published in Man and Environment (Poona, India), 2001(1).

A study on the possible connection between the ancient Indian philosophical system Advaita (an aspect of Vedanta) and certain ideas that circulated in the first two centuries of the Christian Era in the Easter Mediterranean and particularly in Egypt. Also, an attempt to trace great philosophical ideas e.g. The Unity of Being, The identity of Man’s self with the Godhead, etc in Hermetic texts, Vedanta, Christianity, Gnostic writings, Judaism, Greek Thought and Egyptian culture.
Published in VVRI Research Bulletin (Hoshiarpur) vol 2 (43-112), 2003.

This was published in Philosophy and Chronology, 2000, ed G C Pande & D Krishna, special issue of Journal of Indian Coucil of Philosophical Research (June, 2001). A shorter, slightly different version with the title ‘The Rgveda and Indo-Europeans’ by N Kazanas was published in the Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (ABORI), vol 80, 1999 (Pune, India, 2000). It presents the thesis that the RV is far older than mainstream indologists maintain and ascribes the composition of the bulk of it to the fourth millennium BC (some hymns even earlier). It argues that the IndoAryans were natives of Saptasindhu (ie the land of the Seven Rivers in what is today north-west India and Pakistan) examining archaeological, literary, linguistic and comparative-mythological material. Some of the arguments would need reformulation in view of new and firmer (mainly archaeoastronomical) evidence, which in fact reinforce the conlusions on the early date of the RV.

Sept 1999, with Prof. Kak’s permission (kak@ee.lsu.edu).

May 2001, with author’s permission (vishalagarwal@hotmail.com)

This examines some of Prof M Witzel’s (erroneous) notions which perpetuate the AIT (=Aryan Invasion Theory) and which had not been discussed in ‘The RV and IndoEuropeans’. It presents some new evidence and new ideas for a pre-3100 BC date of the RV and the indigenous origin of the IndoAryans and criticizes Prof Witzel’s vicious attacks on some Indian and non-Indian scholars, who promote the indigenist point of view.

N Kazanas wrote ‘AIT and Scholarship’ in May-June 2001. This was first posted here. It deals with some additional (erroneous) notions of Prof M Witzel and the major (but not all) aspects of his ‘Autochthonous Aryans? The Evidence from Old Indian and Iranian Texts’ (EJVS 7-3, pp 1-93, 2001). Apart from the AIT, this study examines other cases of corruption in academic disciplines like Egyptology, Anthropology etc, where evidence against maistream views is discarded, as well as the etymology of the terms ‘academia’ and ‘academic’ and the development from Plato’s Academy in Athens to modern notions.

Prof Witzel wrote a very superficial critique of ‘AIT and Scholarship’ ignoring the title, lampooning the presentation of the development of modern academia and making all kinds of irrelevant remarks (5/7/01). So N Kazanas wrote a reply selecting some of the mosts salient points in ‘Addendum to “AIT and Scholarship”‘: reply to Prof Witzel and incorporating some (lengthy) remarks of V Agarwal. All this was completed and posted in sept 2001 here. The most significant point, apart from Prof Witzel’s irrelevances, is N Achar’s firm discovery that some astronomical dates in the Mahabharata indicate the date of 3067 BC for the Great War.

Reply to nine critics in the debate on Indoaryan Οrigins initiated by and published in the Journal of Indo-european Studies, 2002-2003.

(Journal of Indo-European Studies, Vol. 31, No.1-2: pp.107-185, 2003).
The ” A Reply to Michael Witzel’s ‘Ein Fremdling im Rgveda’ ” was sent to us by V.Agarwal (Minesotta, USA). It was written in July 2003 as a reply to Prof M. Witzel’s ‘Ein Fremdling im Rgveda’, 2003, Journal of Indo-European Studies, and was posted on the Journal’s website. It provides supplementary material to N. Kazanas’ ‘Final Reply’ covering various aspects not dealt with by, or unknown to the latter. One should note that when Kazanas mentions “black copper” (kRshNa-/karshaNa-ayas or Syama- ‘swarthy metal’) he nowhere means bronze as Witzel takes it (p 175) and Agarwal need not have elaborated the bronze-aspect.

In this paper is examined the controversy between D. Frawley and M. Witzel in the newspaper The Hindu (June and July 2003). Frawley claimed that the Rigveda knew of both towns and ocean citing pur ‘fort, town’ and samudra ‘ocean, sea’. Witzel attacked both claims writing that pur means only some mud-palisade or simple fortification while samudra means confluence or heavenly ocean. N Kazanas shows that pur means not a material structure at all but a magical, occult protective shield and that samudra does in many cases mean ‘ocean’.

This paper was published first by Adyar Library Bulletin in 2002. It was revised subsequently several times but found no acceptance (in the West). In 2006 Man and Environment published a revised version.
The paper examines the use of pur and shows that in the RV it never denotes ‘city, fort’ as is usually taken to mean but a magical, occult defence in the non-material world.

This essay is published in 2004 Indian Linguistics. It challenges many generally accepted notions in IndoEuropean linguistics like the 5-grade ablaut, labio-velar sounds, roots etc. At the same time it discloses the great antiquity of Sanskrit (or Vedic) and argues that the Sanskrit retroflex sounds are ProtoIndoEuropean, but lost in the other IE stocks.

‘Planetarium Software and the Date of the Mahabharata War’, by B. N. Narahari Achar
The University of Memphis, Memphis TN 38152
The importance of determining the date of the Mahabharata war for ancient Indian chronology can hardly be overstated. A plethora of dates, derived on the basis of a number of diverse methodologies have been proposed and a consensus has yet to be reached. A number of authors have concentrated on the references to astronomical events such as eclipses found in the epic as a basis for determining the date of the war. However, it has not been possible to arrive at a definite date on the basis of astronomical references either. A new tool in the form of Planetarium Software has become available for examining the astronomical references. It is the purpose of this paper to report some preliminary results that have been obtained in applying this tool for the purpose of determining the date of the Mahabharata war.
Preliminary results indicate that Planetarium software can be used with advantage by simulating views of the ancient skies to determine the date of the Mahabharata war .
The work is supported in part by a Faculty Research Grant of the University of Memphis. The author also wishes to thank Dr. Kalyanaraman for suggesting this problem and for bringing Raghavan’s work to his notice.

The complete lack of mention of an Aryan immigration into India in the vast Vedic literature has been considered a moot point by historians for several decades. Recently however, some scholars have claimed that a Vedic text finally provides evidence for the migration of Indo-Aryan speakers from Afghanistan into India.

Part A of the study Vedic, Mesopotamian and Egyptian Religiophilosophical Thought (in print by PHISPC in the volume Chain of Golden Civilizations). 
This paper is a study of Vedic thought tracing the theme of One and Many and Man’s Self-realization from the RV to the Upanishads. In this the writer examines some ideas about the nature of ‘civilization’ and traces a unifying thread running through the RV, AV, Brahmanas and Upanishads, i.e. man’s return to his source which is the Supreme Godhead, Itself unmanifest but the Primal Cause of all manifestations.

Published in Migration & Diffusion (Vienna) 2005 and after some minor revisions it was subsequently published by the Adyar Library Bulletin (2006: Olcott commemorative issue). This was incorporated in the study Vedic, Mesopotamian and Egyptian Religiophilosophical Thought (in print by PHISPC in the volume Chain of Golden Civilizations)

This paper was written independently in 2002 and has been published in 2006 in Puratattva. This piece was incorporated in the study Vedic, Mesopotamian and Egyptian Religiophilosophical Thought (in print by PHISPC in the volume Chain of Golden Civilizations)
There are more than 20 motifs/themes exhibiting close affinities in the religious texts of the Vedic and Egyptian peoples. Some like the Sungod’s boat, the Water as a primal cosmogonic element, the Cow of plenty and the sacred Bull are common to the Mesopotamian culture too. Some are quite extraordinary and occur only here with some weak echoes in other Indoeuropean branches: the lotus-born one, the eye running off, etc, including many elements in the famous Isis-Osiris tale. These affinities are close and suggest either a common origin for both cultures or cross influences. However, most of the motifs, including the Isis-Osiris and Yama tales, have correspondences in other IE traditions: this fact suggests that the motifs are inherited in the Vedic texts and not borrowed from Egypt. Thus we must conclude either that Saptasindhu, the land of the Vedic people, influenced Egypt or that both cultures derive or borrow from a third unknown one. The former case is difficult to determine as there is no firm evidence for an early contact between Egypt and Saptasindhu. Consequently, without entirely ruling out the possibility of Vedic influences on Egyptian culture we must assume a devolution from an older unknown civilization.

‘Anatolian Bull and Vedic Horse’ was first published in the Adyar Library Bulletin (2003) but this version is revised and expanded.
In this paper the writer examines the presence of bull and horse in the various IE branches. It is noteworthy that the IE stem for ‘horse’ is absent in Hittite while all other major branches have it. The horse has no place at all in the religion, ritual or mythology; the horse’s function is taken over by the bull. This alone suffices to show that the Hittites are not indigenous in Anatolia as some scholars claim and that therefore, Anatolia is not the original PIE homeland. Other types of evidence are used from mythology and linguistics to support this conclusion. The myth of the Weather god killing the dragon, which is a common IE theme (India, Greece, Scandinavia etc), is quite swamped by Near-eastern material. The Hittite language itself has some IE relics but is otherwise flooded with Mesopotamian, Hurrian and Assyrian elements.

This paper was published in the Quarterly Journal of the Mythic Society (Bangalore) Vol 97, No 1 (Jan-March 2006).
In presenting this collection of 20 Vedic and Indo-European theonyms the writer discusses the derivation of some and argue that, since the Rigveda alone contains all these names, it must be older than other IndoEuropean texts and more clearly indicative of the Proto-Indo-European culture, while Vedic is both older and closer to Proto-Indo-European than any other branch. Moreover, since the RV is richer in cultural and linguistic elements than other early IE traditions we can conclude that the Vedic speakers moved very little or not at all from the PIE homeland. These ideas have been published elsewhere and attracted some criticism mainly from J. P. Mallory; this is now being refuted.

Published in VVRI 2006 (Updated Feb 2012)
This paper examines more than 400 lexical items that have cognations in 3 or more IE branches (Vedic, Greek, Italic etc) and denote as far as possible invariable things, qualities and activities (bodily parts, relations and actions like breathing, dressing, rising etc). Sanskrit appears to have lost far fewer items and preserves much greater inner organic coherence than the other branches. This supports the general idea that Sanskrit is much closer to Proto-Indo-European and that, since this could happen only in sedentary conditions, the Indoaryan speakers of Sanskrit did not move (much) from the original homeland. Moreover, the criticism that this conclusion does not take into account the large literature in Sanskrit is shown to be fallacious. This collection of words is a good treasury for any comparisons.

This paper was presented as a talk in June 2006 at the Center for Indic Studies in the University of Massachusetts.
This paper presents the evidences and arguments for a Rigveda composed in its bulk in the 4th millennium BCE. A basic consideration (but not the only one) is that the RV has no knowledge at all of many features that characterise the Harappan culture which began to emerge solidly c3000. Since the bulk of the RV must be assigned to a period before 3000 and since this is by general consensus stated to have been composed in Saptasindhu, then the Indoaryans or Vedic people were present in that location before 3000 and must therefore be regarded as indigenous by 1500, when, they are alleged to move in by the Aryan Invasion/Immigration Theory.