Saraswati flows on in ASI records

but government still in time warp

Rajesh Singh
New Delhi

While it is only now that the union government has admitted to the existence of
the Vedic river Saraswati after being in a denial mode for five years, the
Archaeological Survey of India’s National Museum in New Delhi has all along
displayed for visitors maps and written text highlighting not only the river’s
existence but also its crucial role in sustaining what we know as the Indus Valley
Civilisation.

Not only does the Museum endorse the river’s existence before it dried up, it also
refers to the Indus Valley Civilisation as Indus-Saraswati Civilisation.

The National Museum is a repository of historical and archaeological heritage of

the country and comes under the same Union Culture Ministry whose Minister in the
first UPA regime had categorically denied the river’s existence. The Museum is
patronized by visitors from across the country and abroad.

This is what a text put up in the Harappan Gallery of the Museum says: “Slowly and
gradually these people evolved a civilisation called variously as the ‘Harappan
civilisation,’ the ‘Indus civilisation,’ the ‘Indus Valley civilisation’ and the
‘Indus-Saraswati civilisation.’” After all, experts have pointed out that nearly
2000 of the 3000 excavated sites are located outside the Indus belt and along the
Saraswati course.

The text further elaborates the important role of the river: “It is now clear that
the Harappan civilisation was the gift of two rivers – the Indus and the Saraswati
– and not the Indus alone.” It is clear, yes, but not to the government that only
now has rather reluctantly accepted the river’s existence.

The Harappan Galley also has a map titled ‘Major Excavated Sites of the Indus-
Saraswati Civilisation’ (the terminology once again) which shows the Saraswati
river (dotted possibly because it has dried up) emptying into the Arabian Sea at
Rann of Kutch in Gujarat. Yet another display, the “Harappan Civilisation Map’
highlights the Ghaggar river (dotted) flowing on a similar path. Experts have
identified the Ghaggar – now a seasonal river – as what was once the mighty
Saraswati.

The Museum thus emphasizes the following: one, there was a river Saraswati; two,
it existed in the Vedic period; and three, since the Indus Valley civilisation was
nurtured by the Saraswati as well, the civilisation must be referred to as Indus-
Saraswati Civilisation.

But even in the face of these assertions, backed by years of research and mounting
new evidence, the official response has been status quoist, preferring not to
tamper with old beliefs handed over to us by early Western academics and eagerly
adopted by home-grown experts. ASI director B B Lal writes in the preface of his
acclaimed book ‘The Saraswati flows on’, about the “persistent assertion by
Western linguists and historian and their more vociferous, Indian counterparts
that the Rigvedic Saraswati was the Helmand of Afghanistan.”

Calling the assumption “completely baseless” he pointed out that the Rig Veda
(10.75.5) clearly stated the river Saraswati lay between Yamuna and the Sutlej –
none of which existed in Afghanistan! Since the Rig Veda incidentally mentions the
Saraswati river as many as sixty times, and on many occasions in detail, it should
be clear to all but the supremely blinkered that the river did indeed exist in the
Vedic period.

The establishment of this fact then leads us to a bone of contention: Did the
civilisation end due to an Aryan invasion or the drying up of the river?

N S Rajaram in his excellent book ‘Saraswati River and the Vedic Civilisation’
notes that the discovery of the river ‘dealt a severe blow” to the theory that
Aryans invaded India which then had the Harappan Civilisation. The theory supposes
that the Harappans were non-Vedic since the Vedic age began with the coming of
Aryans.

But the National Museum makes no such distinction. In fact, as we have earlier
noted, it refers to the role of Saraswati in nurturing the Harappan civilisation.
Now, since the Saraswati flowed during the Vedic period, the Vedic era ought to
have coincided with the Harappan age. Rajaram says in his book that the Harappan
Civilisation “was none other than the great river (Saraswati) described in the Rig
Veda. This means that the Harappans were Vedic.”

So, if the Harappans were Vedic and thus ‘Aryan’, who invaded the civilisation and
caused its demise? Experts have pointed out that there is no evidence through the
excavation in the Indus-Saraswati region that an invasion had ever happened, much
less from Aryans who ‘came from outside.’ Rajaram, like many others, believe that
the Saraswati’s drying up was the principal cause for the civilisation’s decline.
This fits in well with the National Museum’s contention that the Saraswati was a
major lifeline of the “Indus-Saraswati” Civilisation.

Rajaram adds his voice to the theory. He notes in the book, “It is beginning to be
recognized that what ended the Vedic Age (the Harappan era) was not any invasion
but the drying up of the Saraswati – an event that was first placed at 1900 BC but
which may have been pushed back beyond 2000BC for the date of ‘complete’ drying up
of the Saraswati river.”

Well known scholar on Indian Studies and Sanskrit, Wendy Doniger is cautious on
the invasion theory. She remarks, ‘The Vedic people had other enemies, and the
Indus Valley people had other, more likely sources of destruction, nor is there
any evidence that their cities were ever sacked… The smug theory that a cavalcade
of Aryans rode roughshod into India, bringing civilisations with them, has thus
been seriously challenged.”

But, although her book is a remarkable history of the Hindus and demonstrates her
knowledge and appreciation of the Hindu way of life, it fails to do justice to the
Saraswati river issue. There is just a very sparse mention of the river that is
not just held in reverence by millions of Hindus but also holds the key to
understanding our ancient civilisation.