h o m e

g l i m p s e s   o n    h i n d u i s m    a n d    i n d i a -  I

c o n t e n t s

India - A Spiritual Giant

Lin Yutang (1895-1976) Chinese scholar, author of Wisdom of China and India, has said: 

"India produced too much religion and China too little." A trickle of Indian religious spirit overflowed to China and inundated the whole of Eastern Asia. It would seem logical and appropriate that any one suffering from a deficiency of the religious spirit should turn to India rather than to any other country in the world." 

It is apparent that only in India is religion still a living emotion. "

(source: The Wisdom of China and India - By Lin Yutang Random House September 1955 ASIN 0394607597  p. 3-4)
 
J. P. Couchoud has observed:

India has "man gone to the farthest limit of his religious faculty. Consequently, religious tales is one of India's richest traditions." in the book Asiatic Mythology - J. Hackin Crescent Books Place of Publication: New York p. 115).

(For more refer to chapter on India and China).

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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India's Fabulous legends:

It has long been recognized that India's tales of gods and goddesses are closely related to those of ancient Greece, Rome and the Nordic and Germanic peoples. So similar are they, indeed that even the days of the week, both in India and in the West, continue to be named after the same deities, who represented the same planets: Sun for Sunday, Moon for Monday, Mars for Tuesday, Mercury for Wednesday (Woden's day in Norse legend), Jupiter for Thursday (Thor's day in Scandinavia; Brihaspati, or Jupiter's day in India), Venus for Friday, and Saturn for Saturday. 

While on a tour of the Parthenon, a guide will tell you that the Greek legends came from India......

(source: The Hindu Way of Awakening - By J Donald Walters p. 46 - 47). For more refer to chapter on India and Greece and Hinduisms influence).

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Democracy on Ashoka's Rock Edict

Ashoka, (273 BC - 232 BC) the most trusted son of Bindusara and the grandson of Chandragupta Maurya, was a brave soldier. He was the most famous of the Mauryan kings and was one of the greatest rulers of India. During his father's reign, he was the governor of Ujjain and Taxila. Having sidelined all claims to the throne from his brothers,  Ashoka was coronated as an emperor.  Ashoka extended the Maurya Empire to the whole of India except the deep south and the south-east, reaching out even into Central Asia. For propagation of Buddhism, he started inscribing edicts on rocks and pillars at places where people could easily read them. These pillars and rocks are still found in India, spreading their message of love and peace for the last two thousand years.

A ringing declaration of Mauryan Emperor, Ashoka at the conclusion of his first rock edict:

esahi vidhi ya iyam: dhammena palana, dhammena vidhane,
dhammena sukhiyana, dhammena gotiti.

The word dhamma or dharma is usually translated "law'' although it could also mean "tradition'' or "truth''. If we choose the common meaning, Ashoka's declaration becomes: 

For this is my rule: government by the law, of the law; 
prosperity by the law, protection by the law.

This sounds like the invocation in Lincoln's Gettysburg address!

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Cultural Unity of India

According to Jawaharlal Nehru: "Right from the beginning, culturally India has been one, because she had the same background, the same traditions, the same religions, the same heroes and heroines, the same old tales, the same learned language (Sanskrit), the village panchayats, the same ideology, and polity. To the average Indian the whole of India was a kind of punya-bhumi - a holy land - while the rest of the world was largely peopled by mlechchhas and barbarians.

Sankaracharya chose the four corners of India for his maths, or the headquarters of his order of sanyasins, shows how he regarded India as a cultural unit. And the great success which met his campaign all over the country in a very short time also shows how intellectual and cultural currents traveled rapidly from one end of the country to another." 

(source: Glimpses of World History - By Jawaharlal Nehru  p. 129). 

According to Ronald B. Inden: " The unity underlying the obvious diversity of India may be summed up in the word "Hinduism." 

(source: Imagining India - By Ronald B. Inden p. 86)

Dr. S Radhakrishnan: "In spite of the divisions, there is an inner cohesion among the Hindu society from the Himalayas to the Cape Comorin." 

(source: The Hindu View of Life - By Sir. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan p. 73-77). 

Cultural unity seems far  more enduring than any artificial geographic or political unity.

Girilal Jain, late editor of Times of India: " It is about time we recognize that we are not a nation in the European sense of the term, that is, we are not a fragment of a civilization claiming to be a nation on the basis of accidents of history which is what every major European nation is. We are a people primarily by virtue of the continuity and coherence of our civilization which has survived all shocks. And though inevitably weakened as a result of foreign invasions, conquests and rule for almost a whole millennium, it is once again ready to resume its march."

(source: Hindu Phenomenon - By Girilal Jain South Asia Books 1998 ISBN 8174760105 p. 21). For more refer to chapter on Glimpses VIII).

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Tansen - One of Nine Jewels

Tansen is considered to be one of the greatest musicians that ever lived. He was the court musician of the famous Mogul Emperor Akbar (16th century).   He was so highly valued in the court that he was called one of the "Nine Jewels" in his court (navarathna).

The details of Tansen's life are incomplete.  He was born in a Hindu community and had his musical training under the great Swami Haridas.  He then went to the court of the Raja Ram Baghela, a great patron of the arts.  From there he migrated to the court of Akbar. It is said that Tansen could work miracles with his singing.   This is called nada siddha in Sanskrit.   He is supposed to have acquired such supernatural abilities through the association with the saintly Swami Haridas.   It is said that on occasion he could create rain by singing the    monsoon rag Megh Malhar.   It is also said that he could create fire by singing rag Dipak.

Many rag are ascribed to Tansen.  Such rag as Mian ki Malhar, Mian ki Todi and Darbari Kanada are the most famous. Today his followers are refered to as "Senia Gharana"

Tansen, the court musician of Emperor Akbar, once plunged the palace precincts in darkness by chanting a night raga, or melody, at Akbar's request, while the sun was still high in the sky. 

(For more refer to chapter on Hindu Music).

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Aurangzeb's great mosque on Benaras Ghat:

In the eighteenth century, Aurangzeb's great mosque above Panchganga ghat dominated the Benaras waterfront. Built on the site of a vast Hindu temple it helped explain the dearth of pre-Islamic architecture in the sacred city. Yet Benaras remained a center of Hindu scholarship where the first Orientalists sought the keys to India's past. 

(source: India Discovered - By John Keay HarperCollins ASIN 0002178591 May 1992  p. 32).

Babri Masjid - A Symbol of slavery ?

The disputed structure at Ayodhya was a "symbol of slavery" and an "insult to the nation" as it was known by the name of an "aggressor." 

The example of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) which changed the names of buildings, cities and roads after gaining independence, shows that Rhodesians did this despite the fact that their erstwhile (White) rulers belonged to the same religion....

(For more refer to chapter on Islamic Onslaught and Glimpses VIII). For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

Watch History of Ayodhya - videogoogle.com.

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Christian Missionaries damaged Easter Island History

Missionaries did more damage to the Easter island's history than even the Peruvian slave traders, which carted off most of the island's population. Those who escaped by hiding in the island's many caves were "saved" by these missionaries, who proceeded to destroy all the islander's wooden sculptures, religious artifacts and most importantly, the Rongo- Rongo tablets, which contained a record of the lost language of the Rapa Nui. So few of these tablets remain that no one has been able to decipher them satisfactorily.

(For more refer to chapter on India on Pacific Waves).

Infamous British Jail or Kala Pani 

Once the capital of the group of islands strewn in this part of the Bay of Bengal, it is home to the (in) famous Cellular Jail or the Kala Pani, now declared a National Monument.

In 1788 AD, the East India Company, in the process of consolidating their foothold in India, summoned the services of Lieutenant Archibald Blair of the Navy, handing him a crisp, short brief - to discover, survey and recommend available sites to which revolutionaries, seditionists and later, convicts could be deported. After a year of scouting in the Bay of Bengal, Lieutenant Blair found an island and named it Port Cornwallis (now Port Blair). He found yet another small island located on the eastern entrance of Port Blair and called it Ross Island.

In 1857, as more and more areas of India joined the rebellion against the East India Company, in what was the first Indian struggle for Independence, the British found it difficult to deal with the surging number of rebels. In an attempt to douse the blazing flames of nationalism, they thought it prudent to segregate them from the rest of the population. A committee was set up to survey and report on the establishment of a penal settlement in the Andaman Islands. Dr James Patterson Walker, an experienced jail superintendent, with four other European officers, 773 convicts, an Indian overseer Muttan Dass, two doctors - Nawab Khan and Karim Baksh - and a guard of 50 men left Calcutta on 4 March, 1858. This lot formed the first group of penal settlers in the Andamans.

Immediately upon arrival, Dr Walker put the convicts, still in chains and fetters, to work. Crude grass and bamboo barracks were constructed for the convicts and thick forests ordered to be cleared. Due to their restricted movement and falling trees, many convicts perished. About 86 convicts, recaptured while escaping, were executed by hanging within a single day and their bodies buried together with their iron fetters. 

(source: http://www.indiagov.org/perspec/sept99/ross.htm)

Veer Vinayak Damador Savarkar (1883–1966) Barrister, Indian patriot, revolutionary, hero of freedom struggle and author of Six Glorious Epochs of Indian History. In 1911 he was sentenced to life imprisonment on the Andaman Islands. This is the site where whippings used to take place, all under the supervision of the Anglo-Indian jailors, the room where Savarkar was locked up for so many years, the room where prisoners were hanged three at a time and the hole through which the bodies were removed outside of the prison wall to be cast into the sea, are all there. It was here that Savarkar was incarcerated along with thousands of freedom fighters, remains a symbol of indescribable colonial cruelty as also of freedom-loving humanity's undying spirit of resistance. After spending 16 years in Andamans, Savarkar was transferred to the Ratnagiri jail and then kept under a  house arrest.

(For more information on please visit  Veer Savarkar  Remembering Veer Savarkar and Veer Savarkar Vindicated: A reply to a Marxist Calumny - By J. D. Joglekar). (For more refer to: History of Andaman Cellular Jail).

On 26th Feb 2003, Swatantrya Veer Savarkar's PunyaTeethi day, when his portrait was unveiled in Lok-Sabha. 

Prime Minister Indira Gandhi said " Savarkar was a great figure of contemporary India and his name is by-word for daring and patriotism. He was cast in a mould of a classic revolutionary and countless people drew inspiration from him." 

In 1970 she had released a postal stamp recognizing the sacrifice and valor of Veer Savarkar to the national struggle and she personally ordered a documentary to be made on his life. She also donated Rs 11,000 from her personal account to the Veer Savarkar Trust.

Please refer to Swatantrya Veer Savarkar: The Eternal Hero - By Dhananjay Kheer Sangam Books Ltd, London, 2nd Ed, 1988, 569 pages ISBN 086132 182 0

The Andaman Cellular Jail is a historic monument that symbolises British tyranny. It was here that the revolutionaries of 1857, the Wahabi Movement, the Moplah Uprising, the Gadar Party, the Lahore Conspiracy Case and Chittagong Revolt were dumped by the British, in the hope that cut off from the mainland, they would be dead and forgotten. "The 13x8 feet cells where we were put in solitary confinement,''  "had moss on the walls and insects crawling all over the floor. We were fed rotis with insects and boiled wild grass as sabzi. We were given stored rain water to drink and even that was rationed. When we went on a hunger strike they force-fed us through tubes, as a result of which many died.'' says 89-year-old veteran freedom fighter and revolutionary, Vishwanath Mathur. 

(source: Kala Pani old-boys Net Work - For more refer to chapter on Glimpses V).

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Nation, Secularism and Hinduism

According to Girilal Jain, editor of The Times of India, says: 

"The nation concept is the product of developments over centuries in Europe. It does not represent only the triumph of the province over the priest; it represents the triumph of an altogether new approach to life. Along with its twin brother, secularism, it represents the triumph of matter over spirit, and of reason over intellect which the Hindus call buddhi. The nation is a new god. Millions and millions have been killed and maimed in the name of the nation. This god could not have arisen without the help of its twin brother, secularism. A nation must by definition be secular because it can rise only on the corpse of religion. 

Communism is an unnecessary ugly face of secularism, just as it is an unnecessary crude face of modern Western civilization as such, that is gross materialism unrelieved by the residue of Christianity in the shape of humanism." Nazism, Fascism and Communism have been expressions of the same Semitic spirit in the secular realm. 

The concept of nation itself is, in fact, alien to the Hindu temperament and genius. Such a concept is essentially Semitic in character even if it arose in western Europe in the eighteenth century. The nation concept too emphasizes the exclusion of those who do not belong to the charmed circle (territorial or linguistic or ethnic) as much as it emphasizes the inclusion of those who fall within the circle. By contrast, the essential spirit of Hinduism is 'inclusivist' and not 'exclusivisit' by definition. In that sense the Hindu fight is anxious to renew themselves in the spirit of their civilization and the state and the political and intellectual class trapped in the debris in which the British managed to bury our people before they left." 

(source: Hindu Phenomenon - By Girilal Jain South Asia Books 1998 ISBN 8174760105 p. 134-135).

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Can Savitri be a Muslim name?

Certainly not in India. But Muslim Indonesians have plenty of Savitris, Gayathris, Leelas, Pushpas and even Seetas among themselves. Indonesia adopted Islam as a faith but continued to hold on to the vestiges of Hindu culture. So you have Sukarnoputri for the current vice president. Bhasa Indonesia has umpteen number of Sanskrit words. Cultural aspects of Diwali and Holi are still observed by Indonesians. Pakistani Punjabis celebrate Basant Panchami and Lori. Bangladeshi women still sport bindi and sindoor and wear saris. In South India, Kali poth is Muslim equivalent for Hindu manglasutra. It symbolizes suhaag. History and cultural past cannot be disowned.Cultural pluralism broadens the vision, fosters creativity, increases tolerance and builds bridges with others.

(source: http://www.islamicvoice.com/december.2000/viewpoint.htm#sav).

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Cultural Orphans of India? or Pakistan-Identity crisis?  

In my opinion the division of the Indian sub-continent was the biggest blunder in the history of mankind.-- Exiled leader of Muttahida Quami Movement, Altaf Hussain.

Pakistan came into being on August 14, 1947 by order of the Governor-General of undivided India. A state was created overnight by government with the concurrence of political leaders. Well, nations are not invented like a machine, or a pharmaceutical cure for a disease. Nations evolve over a large span of historical period in distinct geographical areas. They grow on a common soil and climate. They have a common heritage, culture and art, language and beliefs, racial affinity and shared social norms and traditions. They have a common identity.

The Muslims came to India as conquerors from Afghanistan and central Asia and installed their kingdom as conquerors. Mohammad Ghori invaded India for its fabulous wealth. Babur came as a fortune seeker after losing his kingdom of Farghana in central Asia. These conquerors were joined by other Muslim adventurers and fortune seekers from Arab lands, central Asian countries, Turkey, Iran and remote corners of the Muslim world. The process of immigration from foreign Muslim lands continued for several centuries. The Muslim converts of India added to their numbers. As a class, the multinational, multiracial, multilingual group of Muslims in India always considered themselves conquerors, seldom as Indians. Even the royal blood of Muslim emperors and kings was diluted by marriages of convenience with Hindu princesses. The Muslim of India was a mixture of dozens of nationalities who, as immigrants, distinguished themselves as Muslims, seldom if ever, as Indians. The Muslims of India had no national identity like the later British rulers. When the British lost their empire they retreated to their homeland. The Muslims had nowhere to go when they lost their empire. No Muslim country offered them asylum. They had no homeland and no identifiable nationality except the natural one which they repudiated.

To escape from the perpetual rule of the Hindu majority in a democratic India they claimed the status of a separate "Muslim nation".... The problem of identity and nationhood was never solved. The consequences were soon visible on the ground in the ugly shape of tribalism, ethnicism, regionalism and provincialism, sectarian feuds, conflicts, murders, fratricide and language riots.

(source: http://www.dawn.com/weekly/books/books2.htm)   

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Easter Island and Indus Valley Seals

One of the puzzle that is quite fascinating is that on Easter Island,  2600 miles off the coast of Chile in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, un deciphered hieroglyphics have been found that match those of Mohenjadaro, the ancient Aryan city of Indus Valley region. This is not possible unless the Vedic Aryans had been there nearly 5,000 years ago. 

(source: Proof of Vedic Culture's Global Existence - By Stephen Knapp World Relief Network October 2000 ISBN 0961741066 p. 253).

Characters similar to those on the Indus seals have also been found on tablets excavated from Easter Island. This discovery has presented a difficult problem for the pre-historian. It is not known if the two belong to a common source, if one provided the model for the other, or if the similarity is purely accidental due to in accuracies of drawing. If the Indus models traveled about 13,000 miles eastward, it seems strange that the characters should have remained unaltered, because figures generally do not remain identical during prolonged transmission. And, if the seals were actually made in the Indus Valley and taken to the Easter Island, what is the explanation for the difference in arrangement between the two groups of seals? 

(source: Indian and World Civilization - By D. P. Singhal Michigan State Univ Pr November 1969 ASIN 0870131435 p. 4). (For more refer to chapter on India on Pacific Waves).

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Veterinary science in Ancient India

Since animals were regarded as a part of the same cosmos as humans, it is not surprising that animal life was keenly protected and veterinary medicine was a distinct branch of science with its own hospitals and scholars. Numerous texts, especially of the postclassical period, Visnudharmottara Mahapurana for example, mention veterinary medicine. Megasthenes refers to the kind of treatment which was later to be incorporated in Palakapyamuni's Hastya yur Veda and similar treatises. Salihotra was the most eminent authority on horse breeding and hippiatry. Juadudatta gives a detailed account of the medical treatment of cows in his Asva-Vaidyaka. 

(source: Indian and World Civilization - By D. P. Singhal Michigan State Univ Pr November 1969 ASIN 0870131435 p.187-188). For more refer to chapter on Hindu Culture II).

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Alexander - scourge of Mankind?

According to an Indian scholar, Radha Kumud Mookerji, designating Alexander as the precursor of the recognized scourges of mankind, points out that this contact "was achieved at the cost of untold suffering inflicted upon India - massacre, rapine, and plunder on a scale till then without precedent in her annals, but repeated in the later days by more successful invaders like Sutlan Mahmud, Tamerlane, and Nadir Shah." 

(source: History and Culture of the Indian People -  R. C. Majumdar Publisher: Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan).

E. Badian, has said: "The story of Alexander the Great appears to us as an almost embarrassingly perfect illustration of the man who conquered the world, only to lose his soul. After fighting, scheming and murdering in pursuit of the secure tenure of absolute power, he found himself at last on a lonely pinnacle over an abyss, with no use for his power and security unattainable...Alexander illustrates with startling clarity the ultimate loneliness of supreme power." 

(source: Studies in Greek and Roman History - By E. Badian p. 204).

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Yehudi Menuhin on Indian classical music

"Indian classical music, compared with our Western music, is like a pure crystal. It forms a complete perfected world of its own, which any admixture could only debase. It has, quite logically and rightly, rejected those innovations which have led the development of Western music into the multiple channels which have enabled our art to absorb every influence under the sun. Freedom of development in Indian music is accorded the performer, the individual, who, within fixed limits, is free to improvise without any restraint imposed externally by other voices, whether concordance or discordant - but not to the basic style, which excludes polyphony and modulation." 

(source: Indian and Western Music - Yehudi Menuhin, Hemisphere, April 1962, p. 5)

" While Western music speaks of the wonders of God's creation, Eastern music hints at the inner beauty of the Divine in man and in the world. Indian music requires of its hearers something of that mood of divine discontent, of yearning for the infinite and impossible."  

(source: Mrs. Mann cited in H. A. Popley, The Music of India  LP publications  ISBN 81-86142-87-8 p. 136). For more refer to chapter on Hindu Music).

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Santiago - the Battle cry against Non-Christians

"Santiago" was the battle cry, and the name would often be shouted out by the soldiers in their massacre of the Indians. Santiago Matamoros, St. James the Slayer of Muslims, was the patron saint of the Christian armies of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella when they crushed Granada, the last Muslim community that was left in Spain in 1492. The cry "Santiago" became a call for the heavenly power to purge the Earth of all non-Christians infidels, no matter if they were Muslims or Jews in Europe, Hindus or natives of the Americas. 

(source: The Universal Path to Enlightenment - By Stephen Knapp World Relief Network September 1992 ISBN 0961741023 volume one Two. p. 122).

Watch An Invasion through Conversion - videoyahoo.com

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Sambhota and Tibet

Sambhota is the Sanskrit title meaning the good Bhotiya, or Tibetan. The Tibetans call their country Bodi from which is derived Bhota, by which name Indians called Tibet. The inhabitants of Bhota were thus known as Bhotias.

Indian Interest in Astronomy

A passage from the Aitareya Brahmana, which dates from about two thousand years before Copernicus and centuries before Hipporchus, illustrates Indian interest in astronomy: 

"The sun never sets nor rises; when people think to themselves the sun is setting, he only changes about after reaching the end of the day, and makes night below and day to what is on the other side. Then when people think he rises in the morning, he only shifts himself about after reaching the end of the night, and makes day below and night to what is on the other side. In fact he never does set at all." 

(source: Indian and World Civilization - By D. P. Singhal Michigan State Univ Pr November 1969 ASIN 0870131435 p.  397). For more refer to chapter on Hindu Culture I).

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Vedic Macedonia

USA, Jan 14 (VNN) — In 1977, a royal tomb was found at Vergina, near Saloniaca, in Macedonia, Greece. All the evidence proves it to be the tomb of King Philip, the father of Alexander the Great. However, Western scholars were puzzled because of the many artifacts, within the tomb of an obvious Indian/Vedic nature. Because of these artifacts, some experts dated the tomb to a time after Alexander's. This theory is no longer being accepted. In Michael Wood's series, In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great, he presents 2 sculpted portraits of Alexander and Philip. Archeologists accept these sculpted portraits of Alexander, as the only ones made during his lifetime.

Philip's portrait is also recognized as being made in his lifetime. Where were these portraits found? They were found in the Macedonian tomb, discovered in 1977, thus confirming that the tomb is definitely from before Alexander's march to Asia.

The question is, "Why does King Philip's tomb have so many Indian influences? How is it possible if the Greek and Indian cultures had no direct contact until Alexander's Asian campaigns?"

The answer is simple.

Because Greek culture is an offshoot of Vedic culture, it is only logical that there would be strong Indian influences in Greek art, religion and culture. The tomb of King Philip is also more than proof of Greece's vedic past. It is a smoking gun exposing the extreme prejudice involved in the cover up of the world's ancient Vedic heritage. Though western scholars now admit the tomb to be Philip's, they are mute about the evidences proving Greece's Vedic heritage.Some of the items found in the tomb, include a large ceremonial gold sheild, decorated with Vedic Svastikas, a beautiful frescoe, still in full color, of a lion hunt. Clearly defined, in this frescoe, are boundry markers tied around trees. This is a recognized feature of Indian Royal hunting grounds and yet they are clearly seen in this 2300 year old Macedonian frescoe. A royal diadem was also found of the type worn by Asian Kings and Princes and gold solar emblems remeniscient of the Solar Dynasty (Surya Vamsha) were found in abundance.

How many important finds have gone unrecognized by the mainstream academic community, that has no will nor ability to recognize Vedic artifacts.

(source: http://www.vnn.org/world/WD0001/WD14-5273.html). For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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India in Greece

Many scholars have asserted that the Greeks borrowed heavily from India. According to Greek tradition, Thales, Empedocles, and others traveled to the East to study philosophy. The mystical resemblances and parallels at times are too close and too frequent to be purely coincidental. Features which are attributed to an Indian origin are much in character with Indian thought and alien to Greek attitudes. 

Enfield says: "India was visited by Pythagoras, Anaxardes, Pyrrho, and others, who afterwards became eminent philosophers in Greece." There are authorities who suggest that Plato had found his way to the bank of the Ganges. (source: 

E. Pococke has asserted that Greek civilization, not accepting its language, is a local variation of an Indian culture taken to Greece by early colonists from India. India in Greece. 

(source: India in Greece - By  Edward Pococke London. 1852)

James Princep author of Essays on Indian Antiquities. London, 1858,  is recorded to have observed that "Greek was nothing more than Sanskrit turned topsy-turvy." 

(source: D.S. Mahalanbois, "A New Light on Plato" Modern Review, August 1963, p. 142.)

 Talking of Plato's mysticism, Strutfield says that "India, always the home of mystical devotion, probably contributed the major share." 

(source: Mysticism and Catholicism p. 74.).

Hopkins says "Plato is full of Samkhyan thought worked out by him but taken from Pythagoras. Discussing the historical genesis of Greek antiquity, 

J. P. Mayer observes: " Egyptian, Persian and Indian cultural influences were absorbed into the Greek world from very early times." (source: Political Thought, The European Tradition, p.7)

Sir William Jones has pointed out, "it is impossible to read Vedanta or the many fine compositions in illustration of it without believing that Pythagoras and Plato derived their sublime theories from the same fountain with the Indian sages." 

(source: Hindu Phenomenon - By Girilal Jain South Asia Books 1998 ISBN 8174760105 p- 35-36)

H. T. Colebrooke, the great Orientalist, states significantly that "a greater degree of similarity exists between the Indian doctrine and that of the earlier than the late Greeks." He goes on to conclude that Greek philosophy, especially between Pythagoras and Plato, was indebted to Indian thought. (source: Royal Asiatic Transactions. I.)

A contemporary scholar of Western political thought, John Bowle, briefly but categorically declares that Plato was influenced by Indian ideals. 

(source: A New Outline of World History. p. 91).

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Western Science and Hinduism

The Western scientific background originates from the pre-Christian Greeks, who like the Hindus were accused of being pagans. Christianity had no real philosophy or science or intellectual culture of its own, but in due course of time it adapted the pagan philosophies of the Greeks, along with Greek medicine, science and other cultural forms. On the contrary, Indian culture has had its own tradition of rational philosophy much like the Greeks as we can see in the Upanishads, Sankhya, Nyaya Vaiseshika and the Buddhist schools combined with ethical and meditational disciplines." Thus Western science has more in common with the oriental religions and with Hindu and Buddhist than the Judeo-Christian tradition. The basis of Western science is to be found in the free inquiry of the Greeks. The Church has never been on the cutting edge of science -- on the contrary, it has been the one persecuting scientists. The list of those who earned the wrath of the Church reads like a Who's Who of Science: Copernicus, Bruno, Galileo, Descartes, Tycho Brahe, Newton, Halley, Darwin, Hubble, even Bertrand Russell.

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Chinese learnt Indian mathematics

How well developed algebra was in India can be easily realized when it is compared with the work of Diophantus, who is looked upon as a fountainhead of Western mathematical thought. According to Thomas Heath, 

"The Europeans were anticipated by the Hindus in the symbolic form of algebra, and Williams points out that the Chinese were familiar with Indian mathematics, and, in fact, continued to study it long after the period of intellectual intercourse between India and China had ceased."

(source: Cited in Sarkar, Hindu Achievements in Exact Science, p. 14).

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Cecil Rhodes and World Domination

Is it an honor to hold a Rhodes Scholarship?

What was the intent of Cecil Rhodes? It is world domination. His biographer, Sarah Millin, wrote: "The government of the world was Rhodes' simple desire." His own Confession of Faith was written into his first will dated 1877 which states: "I contend that we are the finest race in the world and that the more of the world we inhabit the better it is for the human race." By the way, he was Caucasian. His plan for world domination was to create: ". . so great a power as to hereafter render wars impossible." One should note there is a difference between the concept of world peace and the concept of world domination. professor, Carroll Quigley, stated in 1949 - "The [Rhodes] scholarships were merely a facade to conceal the secret society, or, more accurately, they were to be one of the instruments by which members of the secret society could carry out Rhodes' purpose." 

(source:http://www.rebsutherland.com/TheRhodesScholarship.htm http://www.fwkc.com/encyclopedia/low/articles/r/r022000724f.html)

Cecil Rhodes dream was to see British possessions running from the Cape to Cairo. Traveling between Britain's Oxford University and the diamond mines of Kimberley, Rhodes gained by the age of thirty both a classics degree and one of the world's largest personal fortunes. Although his imperial ambitions were thwarted - his last words were reported to be : "So little done, so much to do."  "If there be a God," he once said, "I think what he would like me to do is to paint as much Africa British red as possible."

(source: Colonial Overlords: Time Frame Ad 1850-1900  - Time-Life Books. The Scramble for Africa ASIN 0809464667 Noon of the Raj. p. 94-96). For more refer to chapter on European Imperialism).

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Ancient Rome and Indian jewels

Of the jewels, the Romans were specially fond of beryls and pearls. The two beryls mines that existed in South India at Padiyur and Vaniyambadi were a great source of wealth. 

Sacred Thread Ceremony

This introduces the male child to a teacher (guru) in order to receive education, marking the entry of the child into the Brahmacharya Ashrama (period of studentship), the first of the four stages of life. This samskara is performed from the fifth to the eighth year of age, when the male child is invested with a sacred thread (consisting of three strands) to be worn around the neck and waist. The three symbolize the following three debts that the child repays during his adult life: debt to one's parents, debt to one's guru, and debt to God.

The sacred thread is intended to be a constant reminder of one's individual duties and obligations. At the time of marriage and as a part of the wedding ceremony, the bridegroom is invested with three more strands of the sacred thread, which symbolize three more debts that he repays to his spouse. Thus the six-stranded thread around the neck of a Hindu is a reminder of the six debts that he must repay during adulthood.

(source: The Hindu Mind - By Bansi Pandit. p 253-254)

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Yavana - The Greeks

Ancient Indians, it appears originally used the term Yavana for the Ionian-Greeks, but later for all foreigners from the West. Yavanapuri was the Greek city-state. 

Mountain Worship

Situated on the borders of Macedon and Thessaly, the 9600 foot high Mount Olympus was as sacred for the Greeks as were the Himalayas for the Hindus. The Greeks believed that the summit of Olympus reached the upper air where Zeus had his throne surrounded by the other gods and goddesses of Greek mythology. The Canaanites also chose the mountain Saphon, as the abode of their pantheon, and Mount Sinai as the meeting-place of Moses and Jehovah. 

The Art of Spelling

D. Bethune McCartee, a well-known American scholar, writes: "The art of spelling was invented neither by the Chinese or the Japanese. Its introduction into both these countries, (and, as we are convinced, in Corea as well), was the result of the labors of ...the early Buddhist missionaries. In all the three countries...the system of spelling is most undoubtedly of Sanskrit origin." 

(source: cited in W. E. Griffin, Corea - The Hermit Nation p. 338).

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Ancient India and Scandinavia?

Indian commerce and culture possibly traveled even further west than Rome to Scandinavia. This possibility is suggested by the second century inscriptions found at Junnar in western India which refer to the benefactions of two Yavanas, Irila and Cita, who have been interpreted as the amber merchants of Scandinavia. Kushan coins have been discovered in Gaul and Scandinavia. 

The excavations carried out in the mid-nineteen fifties on a small island called Lillion, or Helgo, in Lake Malaren, about 20 miles west of Stockholm, uncovered many foreign objects, including an exquisite bronze statue of the Buddha seated on a lotus throne. 

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Fairy-lore of India

Theodore Gomprez says:

"Practically the entire fairy-lore of the Occident is derived from India. No one disputes this assertion today, but no one as yet can give a completely clear account of the ways and means by which its journey was accomplished." (source: Great Thinkers, Volumes I-II translated by Laurie Magnus, Vol. IV, by G.G. Berry. London: 1901-1912 p. 95).

"It may also be a complete revelation to find that the fabulous Hindu mind is responsible for the genre of animal fables and many stories of the Arabian Nights type, in which Buddhist and non-Buddhist literature abounds."

(source: The Wisdom of China and India - By Lin Yutang p. 6).

H. G. Rawlinson writes: " Numerous European fairy stories, to be found in Grimm or Hans Andersen, including the magic mirror, the seven-leagued boots, Jack and the beanstalk, and the purse of Fortunatus, have been traced to Indian sources." In his article, "India in European Literature and Thought" in The Legacy of India, " Many of them are to be found in the Gesta Romanorum, the Decameron, and the Merchant of Venice, is found in the romance of Barlaam and Josaphat, which is too clearly the story of Buddha, who was changed into a Christian garb, and later canonized as a Christian saint as St. Josephat! And everyone of course knows the story of the Milkmaid who dreamt of her wedding and overthrew the milk pail, now to be recognized in its original form as the story of the Brahmin's Dream, included in the selections from the Panchatantra." 

(source: The Wisdom of China and India - By Lin Yutang p. 6-7)

India has produced a vast, rich imaginative literature and philosophy, and that Indian culture is highly creative and in fact has enriched the world literature with the droll humor that we associate with the Arabian Nights. 

(For more refer to chapter on India and China). For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Christ spend his youth in India?

The celebration of the birthday of Christ might lose a little sheen if we seriously pursue the question, where did Jesus spend 18 years of his life, between the ages of 12 and 30? Both history and gospels, are completely silent about the life of Jesus before his 30th year.

A Chilean diplomat Miguel Serrano in his book, The Serpent of Paradise: The Story of an Indian Pilgrimage (1963) has written of his rich and varied experiences among yogis and sadhus of India. He was looking for great mystics who he believed were living in the Himalayas guarding a magical science. 

During his sojourn in Kashmir, Serrano came across evidence to suggest that Jesus Christ had come to India and that the tomb of Yousa-Asaf in Srinagar was in fact the tomb of Jesus.  

He quotes a legend, according to which he was in Kashmir, the original name for Kashmir, Ka means  "the same as" or "equal to" and shir means Syria. Manuscripts in the Sharda language,  which is derived from Sanskrit, seem to bear close relationship to the biblical story. According to this Kashmir legend, Jesus came to Kashmir and studied under holy men, who taught him mysterious practices. Later the legend says, Jesus returned to the Middle East and he then began to preach among the ignorant masses of Israel the mystical truths he had learned in Kashmir. To impress and to convert them he often used the powers he had acquired through the practices of Yoga, and these were then referred to as miracles. Then in due course Jesus was crucified, but he did not die on the cross. Instead, he was removed by some Essenes brothers, restored to good health and sent back to Kashmir, where he lived with his masters until his death. There is yet another theory, which holds that the Jewish race originated in India centuries ago and some of them came back almost by instinct in search of their roots. This theory ties in with the legend of Jesus Christ also came to live in India at the age of about 13. This legend asserts Jesus spent 17 years in India, finally returning to the country of his birth to preach the doctrine of salvation and to assert that he was the Son of God. 

(source: India Post - By Vinod Dhawan. vol. 6 December 29, 2000. p. 44). For more refer to Did Jesus die in Kashmir - by Abu Abraham). For more refer to chapter on Hinduisms Influence).

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Lord Krishna's stamp in Japan

Did you know that just a couple of years ago Japan issued a stamp showing Lord Krishna playing the flute, yet curiously enough, secular India has not issued a stamp for Lord Krishna on Krishna Ashtami?

Refer to chapter on Glimpses XVII

British  "magnanimity" in India? 

Madras Famine 1877-1878
Willoughby Hooper - Album print private collection.
(source: Indian Art - By Vidya Dehejia p. 399-402).

***

In the 18th and 19th centuries the synthetic dye had not been discovered, so all blue dye was derived from a certain crop which grew only in Bengal. However, this crop took out all the nitrogen from the ground, so that for the next two years nothing else could be grown. The British forced the farmers in Bengal to cultivate this. 

After a year, famine struck, because there was no rice, all the fields had been turned to Neel cultivation. The farmers revolted, and thousands were killed ruthlessly. This went on for decades, so that no village had any rice or money. By the way, the farmers were not paid for the Neel. That was the start of the great Bengal Famine, in which millions died. But the British only cared for the Neel. Actually, this was the first time common people rose in revolt against the British. This torture ended only after synthetic dye was discovered around the middle or early 19th century. 

Did you know that British India used to have signs saying: "Dogs and Indians not allowed"  in public places? and Mahatma Gandhi was thrown out of a train in South Africa for traveling in the first class?

(For more refer to chapter on European Imperialism).

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When Gods Make Their Move

Each Hindu God and Goddess has a chosen mount, called Vahana, on which He or She traverses, the universe. Lord Ganesha's mount is Mushika, a tiny mouse or shrew. He attests to the all-pervasiveness of the Elephant God and carries Ganesha's grace into every nook and cranny.

(source: Hinduism Today).

Faith makes India go around

Hindu shrines abound with legends of gods drinking milk, stories and mysteries. Here a few instances where faith has beaten science!

A stone Nandi (bull) in the famous Tanjavur Pratheeshwara temple in Tamil Nadu, is said to be growing bigger. In an effort to stop the Nandi from growing any further, the temple authorities tried hammering a nail into the Nandi's head. The idol is more than six feet high now. 



In Thane district of Maharashtra, there is a temple devoted to Kopineshwar (Shiva). The temple is around 150 years old. The Shiva linga is believed to be growing. The Nandi that is traditionally placed in front of the Shiva Linga is also said to be moving towards it. It is believed that when the Linga touches the roof and the Nandi reaches the Linga, it will be the end of the 'Kaliyuga'.

In Chuntporni-Jwalaji in Himachal Pradesh there is a 'kundh', which looks as if it is boiling, the priests and the locals even cook rice and kheer in the hot water. But when someone touches the water, it is found to be cold. 

A well near the seashore in Tiruchendur has water, which is very sweet. According to a story, Lord Karthikeya threw his staff near the seashore to quench the thirst of his soldiers while in war with the asuras. These legends are unending. People have tried and failed to come up with logical conclusions to such wonders. 

A neem tree in Shirdi under which Sai Baba used to sit, bears leaves that are sweet. Even the bark of the tree is supposedly sweet. It is believed that anybody who tastes even a small part of the tree is cured of all ailments or is cleansed of all sins. 

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Mass reconversions of Tribals

Thousands of Christian tribals reverted to their “natural” state of Hinduism in Chhattisgarh.

Most of the tribals said they were “disillusioned” with Christianity. “Mine was a Hindu family. But some 20 years ago the preachers came. They spoke of Christ and equality amongst all. They said they would educate us, feed us, clothe us and that no was would be any higher than the other,” said 50-year-old Manjuram of village Jamdohri. “Food flowed into our home like we had never ever dreamt before. In return we had only to visit Church every Sunday. My whole family converted. But immediately after the conversion, the supplies stopped. The priests diverted their attention from us to our neighbors,” Manjuram added.

“You regret that for a few freebies you gave up the religion, your God, the belief that our forefathers nurtured for centuries. Birsa Munda was one amongst us. He fought the British for the country. And I gave up my religion for a few kilos of rice. It’s like you have betrayed your ancestors, your own blood,” said Gandhi Bara of village Katkalu.

“So when the offer came from Kumarji (Judeo), I readily agreed,” he added. “I have returned to my roots now. I will paint my house white today. Kumarji has said he will supply the whitewash,” he added, explaining that in this belt a Christian house is painted with black charcoal and a Hindu house is painted white or blue. 

(source: http://www.telegraphindia.com/national.htm#head1). Watch An Invasion through Conversion - videoyahoo.com

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Churchill hated Gandhi

New light has been shed on Churchill's racist arrogance by the recent release of certain British Intelligence records relating to the period. Some of the records made available have been used by British journalist turned historian Patrick French, extracts from whose readable book Liberty or Death have been published by newsmagazine Outlook in its August 25, 1997 cover story. Patrick writes of Churchill: 

"His understanding of the country's social and religious structures was superficial. He had a broad, emotional Edwardian belief in the racial superiority of the pinkish-grey races and the need to maintain the British Empire". It was once suggested to him that he should meet "some prominent political activists who were then in London". Churchill's reply: "I am quite satisfied with my views on India. I don't want them disturbed by any bloody Indian".

Churchill blatantly employed racist arrogance, bluff, and the myth of British superiority, to stall Indian independence. To him, India only stood for the basis of British imperial power. He was hypocrite enough to stall Indian independence at a time when his own agents in India were busily recruiting Indians for the armed forces. His hypocrisy allowed him to do all this despite the magnificent contribution of the Indian armed forces to the war effort, on several fronts. From a mere 350,000 at the outbreak of World War 2 in 1939, the number rose to well over 2,000,000 "bloody Indians".

The orthodox Winston Churchill sneering at the ‘naked fakir’ (Gandhi) and refusing to preside over the liquidation of the Empire. He did not favor termination of India's colonial status. He refused to meet Gandhi when he was in London. 

***
Winston Churchill's scornful view of India and her religion: "I hate Indians (read Hindus). They are beastly people with a beastly religion."

(source: The Saffron Swastika - By Koenraad Elst Voice of India ISBN 8185990697 Volume 1. p. 532). (For more refer to chapter on European Imperialism).

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Hinduism lies beyond History

Hinduism also lies beyond history. Other faiths, excluding some tribal and pagan paths, are rooted in events. They began on such and such a day, born with the birth of a prophet or the pronouncements of a founder. Thus they are defined, circumscribed, by history. Not Hinduism. She has no founder, no birthday to celebrate. Like Truth, she is eternal and unhistorical. Even if we compel Hinduism to admit of some immanence in history, she merely smiles and brushes aside the few thousand years that most of humanity takes as the crucial narrative. 

To the Hindu those few years are a pittance, and they too perish. While all known human history lies within a few hundred millennia, Hinduism speaks of unspeakably vast epochs, of earthly yugas that last millions of years, of days and nights of Brahma that span billions, of a universe that lives and dies and lives again. Such is India's expansive reading of history. " 

(source: Hinduism Today - December 1994 issue). Watch An Invasion through Conversion - videoyahoo.com

For more refer to chapter on Greater India: Suvarnabhumi and Sacred Angkor

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Charm of Indian Women

Author, Elizabeth Cooper (1915), admires the Indian woman for her innate sense of modesty, her womanliness, her love of home and children and her feminine qualities which to the Western mind may appear as a weakness, but, in fact, constitute her appealing charm. She emphasizes that "if the Western woman offers her gifts of modern education and intellectual advancement, her Eastern sister will not be her debtor if she, by example, presents in return the even more precious charms of obedience, modesty and loyalty which fundamentally are the priceless jewels in the Crown of world's womanhood". 

(source: Indian Perspective September' 98 issue).

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India's Indigenous Systems of Medicine and Medicinal Plants

The medicinal plant Rauvolfia Serpentina, was pronounced "Wonder drug of India" all over the world in 1949 when the British Heart Journal reported that the plant is "Clinically effective in treating high blood pressure". This was reconfirmed few years later, when a Swiss researcher isolated reserpine from the plant root and established it as an antihypertensive and sedative. In India, the plant was being used for more than 2000 years as antidepressant, sedative and in curing mental illness! This is just one example. In Indian indigenous systems of medicine - Ayurveda, Unani-tibbia, Siddha and tribal remedies - more than 2500 medicinal plants are being used. In India, use of medicinal plants is referred to even in the earliest literature, Rig Veda. Ancient Ayurveda has elaborate description of the properties of various medicines; Susruta Samhita has comprehensive description of therapeutics and Charaka Samhita contains an unbelievable and extensive Materia Medica of India. Indian medicines are mostly vegetatitve and are cheap, hardly harmful and are of minimum side-effects in comparison with allopathic medicines. 

There is little question that centuries of colonization takes a toll, its tragic toll on a country's people, religions and languages, but one of the most lasting effects is the attack on its original healing arts. Both Muslim invasions in the 11th and 12th Centuries and later British colonization imposed their own medical beliefs to the point where both Indian folk medicine and Ayurvedic medicine were suppressed. 

The British Medical Journal from the 1920s labeled the oldest healing system in the world as "unsupported metaphysical dogma". But despite being marginalised for decades, Ayurvedic medicine is the final victor. It is unfortunate that during the British Raj, the Indian indigenous systems of medicine took a back seat. Derogatory terms like 'bazar (market) medicines' were used for Indian medicines. The focus was shifted to allopathy - in learning, research, practice and promotion. The Indian systems were virtually looked down upon. But despite being marginalised for decades, Ayurvedic medicine is the final victor. Today, there is a global resurgence of interest in natural healing methods, and Ayurvedic medicine tops the list in terms of the West's latest "alternative" health fascination. Presently, the western world has woken up to the magic of Indian medicinal plants. India is a treasure house of medicinal plants due to the presence of bio-geographical regions varying from alpine, tropical to coastal, and thus is a leading exporter of medicinal plants and herbal formulations to Germany, U.K., France, Switzerland, U.S.A. and Japan, besides many other countries. 

"Ayurveda is the best system of medicine for treating chronic conditions like bronchial asthma and diabetes and now many Russians are realising it,'' said Svetlana A. Mayskaya, president of the Medical Centre NAAMI-AYU, a Moscow-based nodal health agency. The radiation survivors, 50 men and 40 women, were treated at the Moscow centre by four Indian vaids from the Arya Vaidyashala in Kottakal, Kerala." 

(source: Chernobyl survivors respond to Ayurveda, Russia to recognise science - By Sanchita Sharma
http://www.indian-express.com/ie/daily/20010117/ina17044.html  

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Columbus "Discovery"  or  American Indian Holocaust

1492 - Began the process of genocide of Native Americans. "The only good Indian is a dead Indian".

Today, in spite of 500 years of a genocidal colonization, there is an estimated 40 million Indigenous peoples in the Americas. In Guatemala, the Mayan peoples make up 60.3 percent of the population, and in Bolivia Indians comprise over 70 percent of the total population. Despite this, these Indigenous peoples lack any control over their own lands and comprise the most exploited and oppressed layers of the population; characteristics that are found also in other Indigenous populations in the settler states of the Americas. 

The "greatness" of European religions and cultures was brought to the Indigenous peoples, who in return shared the lands and after "accidentally" being introduced to European disease, simply died off and whose descendants now fill the urban ghettos as alcoholics and welfare recipients. 

Of course, a few "remnants" of Indian cultures was retained, and there are even a few "professional" Indian politicians running around.

Watch An Invasion through Conversion - videoyahoo.com

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Maha-Kumbh Mela - 2001

Bathing is a great blessing.

American author Mark Twain, who visited the Kumbh festival in the 1890s, wrote in a memoir: "It is wonderful. The power of faith like that can make multitudes of the old and the weak and the young and the frail to enter without hesitation or complaint."

BELIEVED to be the most ancient and the biggest holy congregation of humanity in the world, the Kumbh Mela in North India (held once in 12 years) is the greatest bathing festival. It is one of its kind with the world's huge assembly of people, symbolising India's unity. The Kumbh is held at the confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers, and Hindu scriptures say this is one of four places on which the Gods spilt a drop of the elixir of immortality. 

The timing of the pilgrimage, whose origins have been dated back to the Neolithic period, is dictated by planetary alignment. This year's event has special significance, with an alignment of planets that will not be repeated for another 144 years.

Some trace the origin of the Kumbha Mela to the Vedic age. Various legends are also part of its history.

According to story when the devas and the asuras churned the ocean, Dhanvantari (the divine leader) emerged holding in his hands an amrita Kumbha a pot of nectar that makes one immortal. For 12 days, a great struggle ensued between the devas and the asuras for the possession of the pot. The devas were alarmed at the prospects of the asuras attaining immortality by drinking the elixir. Ultimately, the devas succeeded. In the meantime, Jayanta (son of Indra, ruler of the heavens) managed to carry it away to the abode of mortals. Guru (Jupiter), Chandra (Moon) and Surya (Sun) were with him. On his way to the heavens, he had to fight with the asuras and kept the Kumbha at four places - Prayag (Allahabad), Hardwar, Nasik and Ujjain. The journey to heaven with the Amrita Kumbha took 12 days equivalent to 12 earthly years. That is why the (Poorna) Kumbha Mela is held in these four places once in every 12 years. Thus these four places became sacred and the devout came to believe that a dip in the waters earned them salvation.

The Maha Kumbh Mela, or Grand Pitcher Festival, takes place every 12 years and sees millions of devotees bathe in the Ganges to purify themselves. Kumbh Mela is certainly very ancient.

Jawaharlal Nehru has written in The Discovery of India, in my own city of Allahabad or Hardwar, I would go to the great bathing festivals, the Kumbh Mela, and see hundreds of thousands of people as their forebears had come for thousands of years from all over India, to bathe in the Ganges. I would remember descriptions of these festivals written thirteen hundred years ago by Chinese pilgrims and others and even then these melas'' were ancient and lost in an unknown antiquity. What was the tremendous faith, I wondered, what has drawn our people for so many generations to this f