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City Under The Sea
By Arun Ram
http://www.india-today.com/itoday/20010604/archaelogy.shtml

Scientists have stumbled upon the remains of what looks like another Harappan town possibly submerged in the Gulf of Cambay due to earthquakes

The Gulf of Cambay, known for its unpredictably turbulent currents and tidal variations, was particularly unkind to a small group of scientists doing a marine pollution check on board Sagar Paschimi some 20 km off the Surat shores in the early months of 2000. The National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT) team could do nothing much but browse through the multi-disciplinary data and samples it collected while doing the pollution check before returning to its Chennai headquarters.

And then, they saw it. "Pebbles on an ocean floor?", wondered NIOT Project Director Dr S. Kathiroli, Is there-or rather was there-a river under the sea?" NIOT Director Professor M. Ravindran and consultant S. Badrinarayan wasted no time in joining Kathiroli to analyse the voluminous data Sagar Paschimi had collected over the months from the area. After a thorough perusal of the acoustic images collected by using sound waves, the NIOT team was virtually convinced that all these months they were sailing over the remains of a Harappa-like civilisation. If unearthed, it would be the first such archaeological find in the Gulf of Cambay.

"It was an accidental discovery," says Ravindran. "We were doing some pollution check for a private company and our teams were collecting routine data. And here we are with clinching evidence of a lost settlement perhaps 6,000 years old." The NIOT contacted the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), which "unofficially" agreed that it could be a Harappan site buried under the sea owing to a series of earthquakes.

The confirmation is yet to come, but the findings are astounding. The acoustic images done by Side Scan Sonar, Sub-bottom Profiler and Multi-beam Echo Sounder give a clear enough view of a number of structures which resemble those of the Harappan age. "The Side Scan Sonar has picked up images of several excellent geometric objects which have to be man-made," says Kathiroli, who spent sleepless nights on Sagar Paschimi during inclement weather in the Gulf of Cambay.

One of the images shows structures like tanks, some square and 40 m long, some 41 m by 25 m. There are even steps visible on the side of the structure, suggesting it was "the great bath", the central feature of Harappan towns. Other striking pictures are those of a group of constructions in an area of 97 m by 24 m resembling the Acropolis of the Harappan culture and a residential settlement spanning an area 73 m by 53 m buried under sand waves and sand ripples. There is even an image of a 44 m-long structure resembling a temple with a pond.

The Side Scan Sonar could not have given better photographs under the turbulent waters where sand currents make imaging extremely difficult. "The monsoon over, we got back with more equipment doing sub-bottom profiles of the structures," says Ravindran. "The results were hair-raising."

The sub-bottom profiler, which penetrates deep under the seabed to give a cross-section view, confirmed the Acropolis structure. A similar profile of the "settlement" site showed structures with well-designed basements. "See," Badrinarayan points his finger still shaking with excitement, "taller structures have deeper basements. Those old guys, I should admit, were great engineers."

The Harappan theory is strengthened by the pebbles which NIOT had stumbled upon. Rounded pebbles suggest that one or many rivers had run their course through the now-submerged region. That virtually every ancient civilisation flourished on river banks adds to the validity of the NIOT find. Moreover, S. Kalyanaraman, in his recent book on the Saraswati, says the river had flowed into the "sagara in the Gulf of Khambat (Cambay)".

An artist's impression of how the ancient city was located. Inset are pictures of sonar images collected by the NIOT team.

 

 

 

 

 

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