The audience at the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan were enthralled by Raj Vedam of IHAR ( Indian History Awareness & Research ) for almost 100 minutes and so were the teachers who attended his conclave organised by the Anaadi Foundation at Yuva Bharathi Public School in Kanuvai on the following day.
A number of leading citizens like S.Gurumurthy, N.Krishnakumar and Ram Gopal of the Indic Book Club took part in the intellectual deliberations. Raj Vedam is an engineer by education and profession and he works for Sneider Electric at Houston in the USA. He had done his bachelors in electrical engineering in the University of Mysore and masters from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru. This was followed by a Ph.D from the Oregan State University in the USA.
The Indian History Awareness & Research or IHAR is at the forefront of updating history on the basis of empirical evidence by using a multi disciplinary approach. Raj Vedam and his colleague Dr.S.Jayakumar took the entire exercise forward with effortless ease. The condensed content was heavy but sweet like Shrikhand and therefore it was possible for the audience to grasp the subject and the intent as well.
Raj Vedam spoke with great clarity to Simplicity, " India is a land which has been inhabited for over 85000 years without a break and therefore it has been possible to accumulate and assimilate knowledge little by little and of course with great alacrity. Our ancestors studied the stars and calculated a number of things with the aid of their own findings like zero, decimals, fractions, the wheel and concept of infinity. Honestly tell me if multiplication or division is possible easily with the Roman numerals. Our people were great with science and there were a number of educational institutions in India and people from around the world came here to learn every subject under the sun and only 20% of the aspirants could secure an admission while the rest learnt under the teachers who lived in and around the universities which dotted the landscape. The Takhashila University was named after Taksha, the grandson of Bharata. " asserted he.
Raj Vedam suggested that each one among the audience should read the lucid book ,' Educational Heritage of India' by Sahana Singh. He spoke at length about the migrations out of India and stated that both the so called Aryan and Dravidian stock was one and the same. Raj Vedam based it on scientific evidence and also stated that the people of the west left this region thousands of years ago from our region.
He spoke about the Pole Star and how each star got its name in Sanskrit and he connected it with geography in a fabulous manner. It was interesting to learn that Zain Ul Abedin got Sanskrit knowledge translated to Persian and also got some Persian books translated into Sanskrit too. The audience got enlightened when they learnt that the Persian translations of the Upanishads facilitated by Dara Shukoh ( the heir apparent of Shah Jahan ) got translated into French thereby becoming the first to take Vedanta to the west.
Added Raj Vedam, " All of us are aware that Southern Spain was ruled by the Moors for centuries but not many are aware that the Toledo School of translation in Spain was responsible for transmitting a lot of knowledge into Europe which was really backward those days. Gererd of Cremona ( 1114 - 1187 ) translated 87 Arabic texts and there was a " Gold Rush " for knowledge in Europe which is best epitomised in a thinkers monument in one of the ports where one get to see some intellectuals waiting for the ship of GOLD /KNOWLEDGE from India.
The French have the largest collection of old works on Saiva Siddhanta.All the renaissance scholars copied extensively from the Indian texts and used it freely without acknowledging the source and therefore it looks as though they did all the research. Whereas the Indians had done much over thousands of years. One book Biblotheca Malabarica has a list of Indian books and the list is 200 pages long. " The audience were pleasantly stunned with the lecture by this engineer who seeks to update the history found in our textbooks.
The scholar does not want to be " jingoistic " and wants to take the process forward by putting it across to the people behind the syllabus and the text books from different parts of the country.
" The Europeans merely plagiarised Indian knowledge and wisdom and gave it to the rest of the world. Our society takes oral transmissions seriously but the western world just believes in the written word. They fail to acknowledge the fact the intonations and pronounciations have helped maintain texts like the Rig Veda intact for thousands of years. Unless they did the research in India for thousands of years it would not have been possible to compute the details connected with the movement of stars. Dharma, Karma and Janma are part of our ethos and the foundation of the philosophy behind every Indian faith. Why should we voluntarily disregard Indic sources ? " asks Raj Vedam.
Raj Vedam suggested that it was duty of the academia to demand an evidence based approach whenever the syllabus was being revisited. " The Aryan Dravidian divide is not based on scientific evidence and was brought about by the colonial masters with the intent of ' Divide and Rule '.
We need a multi faceted approach to history and this will encourage students to study not just history but all related material with interest. Indic thought preceded Greek, Egyptian, Babylonian thought by miles in time and we have to be proud of it. While the middle eastern invaders took to destructive absorption the colonial rulers plagiarised and sold it back to us. Now unlike the past, we should reclaim it peacefully and do it on the basis of scientific evidence backed by intellect, " suggested the visiting ideologue.
The teachers present and Dr.S.Jayakumar were keen to join the bandwagon and one among the audience suggested that such updates and enlightenment could be taken across to the students and through the students by asking them to particpate in workshops, camps, events and contests connected with concepts, ideas and inventions that were brought about by Indians like Aryabhatta and Bhaskara.
Raj Vedam was eager to share details of his IHAR Youtube material and his presentations showed the celestial world in an entirely interesting perspective. He made the participants know how the stars like Ashwini or Bharani were so named or identified. He spoke about Agastya and the movement of Agastya across the Vindyas with the aid of astronomy. Of course he spoke at length about Arikamedu, carbon dating, Dwaraka, the Saraswathi Civilisation etc., Dr.S.Jayakumar eagerly pointed out that the verse beginning with the word 'Poorna..' in the Isopanishad indicates the concept of Infinity.
" The drying up of the Saraswathi caused huge migrations those days and it was a phase of change. The Indus Clay tablets show solstices and other facts. However all of this is ignored and its incumbent upon us to share the truth. Fabricated data was used to cause divisions in the society and its high time we get back together in the name of truth. Is not our motto ' Satyameva Jayathe '. stated the scholar emphatically. Dr.S.Jayakumar of IHAR and the large number of teachers present nodded in agreement and gave valueble suggestions during the discussions at Yuva Bharathi Public School.
The work and words of Raj Vedam of IHAR is sure to create a positive impact on the study of history.