The National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities (NMMA) – workshop at Chennai from October 31st to November 2nd 2023 (4)

The National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities  (NMMA) – workshop at Chennai from October 31^st to November 2^nd 2023 (4)

The CAG Report and the response of the ASI: On 02-11-2023, after lunch Dr Charuta Kulkarni, IIT, Madras talked about her subject, as detailed above. Then, the certificates were distributed to the participants and mementoes were given to some. Now, I discuss about some issues involved in the documentation of monuments and antiquities. As I worked in the GST (formerly Customs, Central Excise, Narcotics – indirect taxation) department, mostly in the Judicial, adjudication and legal sections for more than 38 years from 1980 to 2018, the CAG Reports on the various departments, institutions and others were periodically read, along with the judgments. Here, before coming to the workshop, I have read the Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India Follow-up on the Performance Audit of Preservation and Conservation of Monuments and Antiquities. The issues related to the documentation, workshop conducted etc., were pointed out therein.

The NMMA caught in the web of politics: The National Monuments Authority (NMA) has released draft heritage bye-laws for the supposed site of the Palace of Asoka in Patna, Bihar. The site, located in the Kumrahar area, is being protected by the Archaeological Survey of India. The draft bye-laws aim to conserve and develop the site and have been released based on a field survey conducted by the competent authority. The NMA is responsible for the protection and preservation of monuments and sites, as well as granting permissions for construction-related activities in the prohibited and regulated areas. The Congress party has accused the Modi government of attempting to weaken a law that protects monuments and archaeological sites in India. Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh praised the National Monuments Authority (NMA) for releasing draft heritage bylaws for the conservation and development of protected monuments in Bihar. Ramesh stated that the Congress and other parties have successfully resisted the government’s attempts to weaken the law so far. He also emphasized the need to strengthen and maintain the professional character of the NMA.

2015 to 2022 no workshop conducted: The CAG pointed out that, “Since March 2015, no workshop was held to facilitate documentation work, rectify mistakes or to provide clarification to agencies involved in the process. As a result, there was absence of a system for regularly up-grading the technical capability of executing agencies, which affected the work process.”

The documentation process carried on by NMMA: The CAG  pointed out the lacunae in the documentation of the monuments[1].

NMMA has given these figures to the CAG.

Issue of “Non-antiquity” certificates by the ASI: ASI (respective circle) issues a certificate of non-antiquity for the exportof art-objects, arms. Here, who issues such certificate, after analyzing the “non-antiquity” nature of te object. Otherwise, millions of Indian antiquities would not have been illegally exported out 0f India after 1947 or 1976.

2. To facilitate Custom Authorities in allowing non-antiquities to be exported, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has established Expert Advisory Committees to issue non-antiquity certificates.

India’s rich cultural heritage, bureaucratic apathy and poor implementation of antiquities protection law has made India a fertile ground for loot and smuggling of antiquities for sale in the International market. In recent years, there has been growing concerns over antiques being smuggled and sold to fund terrorists’ activists.

According to the Antiquities (Export Control) Act, 1947 [Act No. 31 of 1947]  – “antiquity” includes-

(i) any coin, sculpture, manuscript, epigraph, or other work of art or craftsmanship,

(ii) any article, object or thing detached from a building or cave,

(iii) any article, object or thing illustrative of science, art, craft literature, religion, customs, morals or politics in bygone ages,

(iv) any article, object or thing declared by the Central Government by notification in the Official Gazette to be an antiquity for the purposes of this Act,

Provenance (origin, attribution, derivation) includes the list of all owners from the time the object left its maker’s possession to the time it was acquired by the current owner. However, here in the workshop, it is taken as “Province”!

Most of the exports of antiquities take place from north India from airports: According to Section 2(1) (a) of the Antiquities and Art Treasurers Act, an antique is defined as an article or object of historical interest that has been in existence for not less than one hundred years.

The import and export of antiques is covered by the prohibition imposed under Section 11 (c) of the Customs Act 1962, specifically referred to as The Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972.

Similarly, exports are also under the prohibition category. The export of antiques can only be done by the central government or any authority or agency authorised by the central government.

 The law does not permit any private person to export antiques. If any private person exports antiques, there are penal provisions to confiscate the material and impose monetary penalties or prosecute the person.

Port	Location	Value (INR Million)
Pakwra	Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh	34..567
Kolkotta Air cargo	West Bengal	27.151
Nhava Sheva sea[2]	Raigad district, Maharashtra	20.475
Mundra[3]	Gulf of Kutch near Mundra, Kutch district, Gujarat.	11.141
Chennai sea	Tamilnadu	7.381

The ASI blaming the Customs department: When Arun Raj said that the Customs department was not co-operating, I pointed out that it is not that the Customs department did not cooperate with the ASI officials, but, the ASI officers only many times did not turn up, when they were requested to come and identify the objects of antiquity were seized at the airports. Moreover, they have to go by the certificates issued by the ASI only and in many cases, the Customs officers could get genuine doubt that older antiquities were taken out of India, instead of recent artefacts. Sreelakshmi responded that the ASI officers were asked to verify the import of Indian artefacts. Then, I clarified that it was different, because, the art-smugglers had been adopting a modus operandi, as if such antiquities were imported legally so that they could again export. That is why they sought the help of the ASI for the identification of the objects[4].  There have been several reports urging the ASI to co-ordinate with the RI, Customs etc., but, they are not doing so[5]. As the certificates issued by the ASI are / have to be relied upon and whenever, the Customs officers have any doubt about the object for antiquity, they used to seek the help of the ASI officers, but, they hesitate to come.  The famous VJA Flynn case also pointed out by me[6]. Here, VJA Flynn had contacts with many historians and archaeologists, but, caught red-handed in smuggling artefacts out of India[7].

The illegal import and export of Tipu Sultan’s sword: The classic case of Vijay Mallya in 2005, imported Tipu Sultan’s famed sword to India and exported it without any license[8]. Mallya was served a show cause notice by the Customs Department for exporting without informing the government, and not paying the duty for it[9]. However, the tycoon felt that since the sword was a matter of national pride, he should have been exempted. Thus, the provisions of the Antiquities and Art Treasure Act, 1972, have been amended to do away with several lacunae in the Act, commonly recognised as the Customs Act. As per the Act, any private buyer that buys an antiquity of Indian origin and brings it to India must first acquire a license. This is granted on the basis of several factors, including the experience of the person in the art trade, the place of exchange of the art object, the name and the number of people involved, etc. Domestic trade of antiquities is currently unregulated, as the Act is silent on it. The statutory authority of the Act is usually the Director General of the ASI, who decides what an antiquity or art treasure is. As per Section 2 of the Act, any coin, sculpture, painting, epigraph, artwork, object from a building or cave and object of historical interest that is over one hundred years old, is defined as an antiquity. In circle offices of the ASI around the country, where the DG is usually not present, the Act cannot be implemented by any officer below the position of a director. “Yet, several circle officers have been flouting the rule, declaring several antiquities as invalid leading to the thriving of the smuggling of art objects,” said the official.

All departments of GOI should work together: The CAG has been part of the GOI and all other departments also have been parts of GOI. The CAG has been auditing the accounts of different departments and trying to advise to implement the Act and Rules under which they work. All have been working with the Public Finance and the government is responsible to account for every rupee that collected from the citizens. As our country has been handling more than 100 crores population, now 140 crores, we have more responsibility than other countries with less population. Moreover, our government and democratic polity have been so open that everybody can appreciate and criticize also, unlike other countries. Thus, the ASI has been having the most noble duty, virtuous responsibility and righteous accountability in handling thousands of years of monuments and temples; sculptures and coins; palaces and buildings; ghats, and others. It can invite the officers of the other departments for discussion to sort out the practical problems. After all should work for the progress and development of our country creating awareness about culture, tradition, heritage and civilization.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

05-11-2023

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[1] Report No. 10 of 2022; https://cag.gov.in/uploads/download_audit_report/2022/Chapter 6-062f0de36c49e05.39285992.pdf

[2] Jawaharlal Nehru Port, also known as JNPT and Nhava Sheva Port, is the second largest container port in India after Mundra Port. Operated by the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust Authority (JNPTA), it is located on the eastern shores of Arabian Sea in Navi Mumbai, Raigad district, Maharashtra.

[3] Mundra Port is India’s first private port (adani) and largest container port, located on the northern shores of the Gulf of Kutch near Mundra, Kutch district, Gujarat.

[4] Press Release dated 24-07-2023, Three Hundred Forty Eighth Report on the subject „Heritage Theft – The Illegal Trade in Indian Antiquities and the Challenges of Retrieving and Safeguarding Our Tangible Cultural Heritage,” Sansad News.

[5]https://sansad.in/getFile/rsnew/Committee_site/Committee_File/Press_ReleaseFile/20/173/656P_2023_7_12.pdf?source=rajyasabha

[6] K. V. Ramakrishna Rao, Historians involved in smuggling also – The historical case of Prof. V.J.A. Flynn, a friend of many Indian historians – arrested for smuggling, jailed and deported to Australia for further proceedings!, February 17, 2022.

[7] https://kvramakrishnarao.wordpress.com/2022/02/17/the-historical-case-of-prof-v-j-a-flynn-a-friend-of-many-indian-historians-arrested-for-smuggling-jailed-and-deported-to-australia-for-further-proceedings/

[8] DNA India, ASI for easier norms for private import of antiquities, Amrita Madhukalya, Updated: Nov 02, 2016, 07:05 PM IST.

[9] https://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-asi-for-easier-norms-for-private-import-of-antiquities-2269587

The National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities (NMMA) – workshop at Chennai from October 31st to November 2nd 2023 (3)

The National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities  (NMMA) – workshop at Chennai from October 31^st to November 2^nd 2023 (3)

The third day proceedings of the NMMA Workshop for the Southern Region: The following speakers delved upon their respective topics and specialized areas. Though, the topic has been documentation of the objects, the speakers mostly discussed about their findings with their valuable experience with important points.

• Prof. Deivanayagam, Tamil University , Thanjavur
• Shri Nishant Zodape and Shri Yash Gupta, on utilisation of open-source software for creating databases,
• Dr. Muthu Shankar, Head of GIS Applications, French Institute, Pondicherry ,
• Dr Arun Raj.T on strategies for stopping illicit trafficking of antiquities” and ultimately
• Dr Charuta Kulkarni, IIT, Madras talking about INQUA Database on Global South

Prof. Deivanayagam, Tamil University, Thanjavur: speaking on identification of Chola Bronzes. He explained with photographs pointing out the nuances of the bronzes. To understand his speech, one should know other subjects also, as because of his versatile experience, he explained many details about the icons and sculptures.

Cholas’ bronzes: Chola bronzes were typically of deities, royalty and the politically powerful people of the day-all in a distinctive Chola style, classically representative of the human form, and perfectly proportioned. The sculptures are recognizable by the way the bodies are posed. They are always graceful, elegant and sensuous, particularly if a sculpture is that of a couple, such as Siva and Parvati. The bronzes also depict the “mudras” or gestures derived from classical dance. Chola master sculptors created their works with the cire perdue, or lost wax process, which is still in use today.

There are two methods of casting metal images-solid and hollow casting. The required image is fashioned by the stapathi in bees wax. Then the wax model is given several coats of fine clay. The clay mould is then carefully dried under the sun. After a few days the clay mould is ready for casting. When the wax model is prepared and is ready for the preparation of the clay mould, arrangements for the preparation of the alloy are made. The five metals to be used in the alloy and they are -copper, silver, gold, brass and lead popularly known as panchaloha. In actual practice by chemical testing we have found the percentages of the metals as follows:

How manufactured – alloying technique[1]: Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin. Normally bronze is a composite alloy of metals-copper, tin, lead, silver and gold in varying proportions. However analysis of South Indian bronzes reveals that they invariably consist of copper, tin, lead, zinc and iron. Trace elements such as arsenic, antimony, Bismuth etc., have been detected. Above l% is considered as a major element and below 0.1% is considered a trace element, e.g. Copper: 79%: Tin 5%, Lead: 13% Zinc 1%; Iron 1%; Trace elements arc arsenic, antimony, nickel and silver and no gold is Present. Manipulating the alloying elements, different shades of metal were produced. This shows tin has been used. Therefore, the alloy is predominantly of copper, tin and lead. The presence of gold and silver is rare or trace. The clay mould with the wax model inside it is baked skillfully over all the wax. When the alloy is ready, it is poured through the orifice into the empty mould in a thin, even and continuous stream. The molten metals allowed for cooling. Then the mould is broken open and the solid metal image is obtained. The image is given finishing touches by the sthapati. This part, the opening of the eyes of the image is what imparts the exquisite expressions on the faces. This is done under some sort of spiritual inspiration. Sometimes, Stapathis are known to take even weeks to open the eves. The science of Image making is dealt with in the ancient Indian science of Silpasastra (Sculpture Science).

Hollow casting- In this case, the object is moulded in clay and the core is coated with wax, which in turn is covered with a coating of clay. After draining the wax by heating, the mould is used for casting. This method is usually associated with North India.

Patina and patination: A Patina is a thin layer of corrosion, usually brown or green, that appears on copper or copper alloys as a result of natural or artificial oxidation. Patina is a thin layer that variously forms on the surface of copper, brass, bronze and similar metals and metal alloys (tarnish produced by oxidation or other chemical processes).On metal, patina is a coating of various chemical compounds such as oxides, carbonates, sulfides, or sulfates formed on the surface during exposure to atmospheric elements (oxygen, rain, acid rain, carbon dioxide, sulfur-bearing compounds. The green patina that forms naturally on copper and bronze, sometimes called verdigris, usually consists of varying mixtures of copper chlorides, sulfides, sulfates and carbonates, depending upon environmental conditions such as sulfur-containing acid rain.

Nishant Zodape and Yash Gupta: They explained “on utilization of open-source software for creating databases”. With “access” how the excel can be used for filling up data and create a document.

 Muthu Shankar: He explained about the “South Indian Historical Atlas” with many facilities, but, it is not available to the public. The primary data for the project comprise historical and geographical information collected from a large corpus of south Indian inscriptions besides archaeological data collected from a series of field surveys supplemented with the data taken from archaeological reports of ASI and other institutions.   Workshop/review meetings were held every six months are to evaluate the progress of the work. The atlas was developed as web-browser software allowing different basic GIS display and database querying functionalities necessary for a user-friendly usage of the Atlas. It uses W3C (WWW Consortium) compliant Graphics /Open GIS so that the system can be accessed through the internet. The atlas has a conceptual resilience on how to curate data, compile information from it, and disseminate it through new digital tools available then, even when illustrative examples in the application of data science mehods in historical research was scarce. This resulted in the curation and archival of historical data sets that encourage data-driven inquiries into the past, while integrating data, computational science methods into historical research.

T. Arun Raj, director NMMA, Noida: Talked on “strategies for stopping illicit trafficking of antiquities.” Perhaps, next to Pramod Joglekar, he directly discussed the issue with examples. He pointed out how Alexander Cunningham used to travel on a donkey visiting archaeological and ancient places for collecting details. The ASI at present listed 3697 monuments as protected. He pointed out how the Delhi Iron pillar was brought to the present place and Rajendra Cholas brought sculptures as “war trophy” to Thanjavur. Alexander Rae and others carried on excavations even before the formation of ASI and collected many objects. He left some at Egmore Museum and others were taken to London. Even now, the ASI is struggling to deal and store the smuggled artefacts returned back to India. In Trichy, the sculptures have been lying there for more than 20 years, which were recovered. Though HR & CE recorded more than 36,000 temples and quantified 9,000 bronzes many others appear to be not accounted. However, for the export of antiquities, thousands of applications are filed with the ASI, Chennai and they are pending. Nealy more than 20,000 applications have been pending, because, there are no expert persons to identify the objects mentioned in the applications as “less than 100 years” or not. Thus, the crucial problem comes here. Once the certificate is given, the antique object would go out of India legally. He pointed out that unlike Sri Lanka, India does not have “Heritage Police,” and hence, the illegal export / smuggling out of the antiquities have been going on. He also pointed out as how a lesson has been included in the CBSE syllabus to adopt a monument nearby school, so that awareness is created not only among the school children, but also the public living surrounding the monument.

Dr Charuta Kulkarni, IIT, Madras: Talking about INQUA Database on Global South[2], she explained related issues. Stemming from the PAGES-INQUA supported early-career researcher workshop on “Past Socio–Environmental Systems (PASES)” (pastglobalchanges.org/calendar/26972) in 2020, the INQUA-funded project “The whole is not the sum of the parts: building a synthesis database of past human–environmental systems in the Global South (pSESYNTH)” has initiated research collaborations among paleoscientists from, and/or working on, the Global South and other underrepresented regions of the world (e.g. Australia, Southeast Europe). Pursuing the Integrated, Coordinated, Open, and Networked (ICON) approach (Koren et al. 2022), the overarching goal of pSESYNTH is to establish, articulate and strengthen regional, interdisciplinary teams for studying past socio–environmental systems of the Global South, and to build the first multi-disciplinary paleo database representing its regions.

pSESYNTH primarily focuses on the Holocene (the last 11.7 kyr) because: (i) there is greater spatial availability and better chronological controls of the datasets compared to the Pleistocene, and (ii) the Holocene is characterized by a progressive degree of anthropogenic influence over landscapes, offering ways to explore the evolution of diverse socio–environmental systems. Under the pSESYNTH framework, linking proxies of environmental change with climatic signals and societal processes (e.g. subsistence strategies, growth rates, migrations) will provide baselines to pose and test multiple hypotheses for explaining the trajectories of socio–environmental systems. Specifically, pSESYNTH activities are being developed around three main objectives.

To explore drivers of past environmental change combining a diverse set of proxy information, organized into three themes: paleoecology (e.g. pollen, charcoal, diatoms), paleoclimatology (e.g. biomarkers, stable isotopes, varves, numerical simulations), and archaeology (e.g. radiocarbon dates, phytoliths, archaeobotanical remains, material culture).

2) To quantitatively analyze the links among paleoecology, paleoclimatology and archaeology, with an emphasis on research questions that can be generic across the Global South (e.g. are there connections, or commonalities, between colonial legacies and the evolution of socio–environmental systems in the Global South?) or specific to each subregion (e.g. at what spatial and temporal scales were human–environmental systems coupled or uncoupled to climatic fluctuations?).

3) To share the outputs and products of the project in the form of a database that meets the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable) principles (Wilkinson et al. 2016). pSESYNTH participants will capitalize on existing single- and multi-themed databases (e.g. Neotoma, NOAA, PANGAEA, p3k14c, ArchaeoGlobe) in complementing their data contributions in the novel Global South database. Together, the FAIR–ICON principles will underpin the database organization and will ensure geographic coverage, comparability, and accessibility for time-series data synthesis, which is crucial for mainstreaming paleoscience research from the Global South.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

04-11-2023

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[1] T. S. Sridhar (ed.), The Cholas Bronzes – 1000^th anniversary of Thanjavur Big Temple celebrations Sept 25^th to Oct.4^th 2010, The Tamilnadu State Archaeology Department, Chennai, 2011, pp.12-13.

[2] Charuta Kulkarni and others, pSESYNTH project: Community mobilization for a multi-disciplinary paleo database of the Global South, https://pastglobalchanges.org/publications/pages-magazines/pages-magazine/137240

Peace Congress 2023 – “Conflict analysis and conflict resolution” conducted at state level conference held on September 19th 2023

Peace Congress 2023 – “Conflict analysis and conflict resolution” conducted at state level conference held on September 19^th 2023

the “Peace Congress” held at WCC

Peace Conference in Chennai at WCC: The Women Christian College (WCC) conducted a Peace Congress 2023 on 19^th September, 2023 at their college campus. It was organized by the department of Advanced Zoology and Biotechnology and sponsored by the United Board for Christian Higher Education in India (UBCHEA). It was about “Conflict analysis and conflict resolution” conducted at state level. UBCHEA claims that it, “is committed to education that develops the whole person – intellectually, spiritually, and ethically. They claim[1] that the draw strength from our Christian identity and values and our collaboration with Asian colleges and universities. Together we prepare individuals for lives of professional and personal fulfillment and meaningful service in community with others. The United Board is a nongovernmental organization. We are registered as a tax-exempt, nonprofit organization in the United States and as a public charity in Hong Kong”. They have Chennai Consultancy Office within the WCC campus[2].

the program of conference…..

21-09-2023 – International peace Day[3]: Each year the International Day of Peace (IDP) is observed around the world on 21 September. The UN General Assembly has declared this as a day devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace, through observing 24 hours of non-violence and cease-fire. Never has our world needed peace more. This year’s – 2023 – theme is Actions for Peace: Our Ambition for the #GlobalGoals. It is a call to action that recognizes our individual and collective responsibility to foster peace. Fostering peace contributes to the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals will create a culture of peace for all. Perhaps, coinciding with that day, the organizers might have decided to conduct such programmes. 2023 marks the mid-point in implementing the Sustainable Development Goals. The 2023 observance of the International Day of Peace coincides with the SDG summit (18 – 19 September) to mark the mid-point milestone. The SDGs aim to bring us closer to having more peaceful, just, and inclusive societies, free from fear and violence. But without the buy-in and contribution of a wide range of actors including the 1.2 billion young people alive, the goals will not be achieved.

Invited speakers – Dr Mallika Joseph….

Mallika Joseph presenting her paper…………………..

Rev John Prasad…………..

John Prasad presenting his paper……………………………………..

Karthikeyan presenting his paper………………

Varieties of programmes in one day: It is evident that the programmes had been mainly targeted students. In one day congress, they had –

• Paper presentation (students)
• Paper presentation (staff)
• Mime
• Role play

However, as they had sent circulars to perhaps all Universities and colleges, perhaps, “staff” also participated. No list of papers, and other details were given to the paper presenters. As they (the events) were held simultaneously at different places, all could not attend the programmes taken place.

History of UBCHEA[4]: Founded in 1922, the United Board’s work in its first three decades focused on 13 Christian colleges and universities in China: Fukien Christian University, Ginling College, Hangchow University, Huachung University, Hwa Nan College, Lingnan University, Nanking University, St. John’s University, University of Shanghai, Shantung Christian University, Soochow University, West China Union University, and Yenching University. The United Board took its name from the union of the governing boards of these institutions, which recognized the benefits of combining their efforts to create and sustain higher education institutions. United Board support came in the form of raising funds and coordinating their use to support capital construction, library collections, student scholarships and other critical educational functions, including sponsoring visiting American faculty and staff. The United Board suspended its work in China in 1951 and shifted its efforts to other places, becoming the largest single source of funding support of Tunghai University in Taiwan and providing major support to Chung Chi College in Hong Kong in its early years. Elsewhere in Asia, the United Board provided critical assistance to International Christian University in Japan, Yonsei University in Korea, and Silliman University in the Philippines. Later decades brought expansion of the United Board’s work to additional institutions in Cambodia, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, Myanmar, Taiwan, Thailand, Timor-Leste, and Vietnam. The United Board was formally invited to return to mainland China in 1980, and has provided extensive support there for faculty development, new academic disciplines, and programs to improve teaching and learning. Today our network continues to thrive and grow. In recent years, we have worked with more than 80 institutions of higher education, from 15 countries and regions, providing scholarships, fellowships, training, professional development, project grants, and general support to promote whole person education in Asia.

Invited speakers speak: Dr Mallika Joseph, Rev Dr John Prasad and Dr T. C. Karthikeyan talked from 10.00 am to 1.00 pm and there was no discussion. Though Mallika raised some questions, there was no discussion and she did not answer also. When John Prasad started his topic on “Science to hurt, Science to heal,” the power went off. Perhaps conflict started in the deliberations. The speeches appeared to have addressed students and they carried on their discourses. Particularly, the last speaker Karthikeyan took about one hour and went on to explain all his slides. Even after finishing his speech, there was no rapporteur or sectional head. Perhaps, he could utilize the time to exhaust. Though, they delved upon – positive peace and negative peace theoretically, they could not come to any practical solution. Their expressions used – positive peace and negative peace have been intriguing. Then, one may think about neutral peace, zero peace, peaceful peace, peaceless peace and so on with verbose. 

Conflict resolution is required or solution for peace?: When people are getting affected, then, definitely solution has to be given immediately. The root cause of malice that affects peace has to be recognized and eradicated straight away. It is not managing conflict, as such condition naturally allows conflict and then, resolution is sought to control and contain. Why the Sri Lankan issue was given importance now, is not known. In the case of Sri Lanka conflict, Tamils, Buddhists, Muslims, Christians” were mentioned repeatedly by the speakers, but, how and why certain people groups is identified with languages, whereas, other with religion is not known. It is well-known that all Tamil-speaking people are identified by their religion as mentioned or all Sri Lankan Buddhists, Muslims, Christians may not be speaking Tamil or speaking other languages also. Particularly, when their speeches are addressed to students, the speakers should not feed or thrust their ideas on them. Therefore, such bias would in fact create conflict among the researchers. The importance given to “Manipur incidence” has also been intriguing. Every speaker seems to mention it one way or the other, though, all the issues connected with it were not analyzed, discussed or debated. About the emphasis given to LTTE, Sri Lanka issue, etc., already pointed out.

from Stella Maris College…

Paper presentation – staff

Paper presentation (staff): As no list of papers to be presented was given, one had to follow what was presented. There were only six paper presenters and time given was five minutes each and some discussion allowed. Rev Dr John Prasad presided over. Ironically, the first paper presenter went away after presenting paper. This is just like what has been going on in other seminars, conferences and workshops. So just imagine the position of the last paper presenter, he / she and the sectional head would be there with empty chairs.  As no details were given, the papers presented were in the following order:

1. Assistant Professor from …..Stella Maris College.
2. J. Soundararajan HOD, Ancient History and Archaeology, University of Madras.
3. K. V. Ramakrishna Rao, Guest Faculty, Ancient History and Archaeology, University of Madras.
4. Assistant Professor from Fatima College, Madurai.
5. Assistant Professor from Fatima College, Madurai.
6. Thanga Rajesh, Asst.Prof, Defence & Strategic Studies Guru Nanak College. …

Based on Tamil novels, social media and other such sources, they started presenting papers, particularly from Fatima college.  The paper, “A Critical Study of Conflict analysis and conflict resolution,” was presented jointly by J. Soundararajan and K. V. Ramakrishna Rao and I presented my paper, “Afflicting issues, Inflicting problems and Conflicting zones.”

from Fatima College, Madurai……

Last paper presenter………

Students’ paper presentation: It was held at a different place. As there was no PPT provision, they were asked to present their papers.

Valedictory function: Dr Bernard D’ Sami, Dr. Bernard D’ Sami served as an Associate Professor in History and former Head of the Department of History at Loyola College, Chennai. He recently concluded his tenure as Dean of the School of Excellence (SHE) and is the Senior Fellow at LISSTAR (Loyola Institute of Social Science Training and Research) at Loyola College, Chennai. The other rituals were carried on as per their schedule.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

20-09-2023.

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[1] UBCHEA, https://unitedboard.org/about-us/about-united-board/mission-vision/ In the brochure, a brief about UBCHEA has been given.

[2] UBCHEA, Chennai Consultancy Office, Riverlands Hostel Building, Women’s Christian College, 51, College Road, Nungampakam, Chennai – 600 006, India, Phone: (91)44-29819718

[3] 2023 Theme -Actions for peace: Our ambition for the #GlobalGoals;  https://www.un.org/en/observances/international-day-peace

[4] In the brochure, a brief about UBCHEA has been given.

Analysis of Archaeological Material Remains through Geoarchaeology, Geo-Micro Fossils and Literary Sources of South India (1)

Analysis of Archaeological Material Remains through Geoarchaeology, Geo-Micro Fossils and Literary Sources of South India  (1)

Research and seminar under RUSA: The Department of Ancient History and Archaeology, University of Madras conducted a two-day seminar on how geological survey, fossil and literature studies with archaeological remains could contribute to history,, archaeology and related disciplines. The topic is Analysis of Archaeological Material Remains through Geoarchaeology, Geo-Micro Fossils and Literary Sources of South India[1]. This study is being carried out under Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA)[2], a holistic scheme of development for higher education in India programme with funds received. Departments of Ancient History and Archaeology, Geography, Tamil Literature and Mathematics participated work together in this project. Thus it is a multidisciplinary research seminar organized and held on 17th and 18th of August 2023 in the University campus.

The announcement made in June 2023 about the Seminar: About this seminar, there was a news note appeared in Dinamalar, “On behalf of the Department of Ancient History and Archeology of the University of Chennai, next month, on the 13^th and 14^th,  (now dates changed to August 17^th and 18^th) research papers are invited in the international seminar on the topic ‘Geoarchaeology, Geomicroforms’. For this, comments including ‘Geo microfossils, Geoarchaeology’ should be sent to the address ‘Head of Department, Department of Ancient History and Archaeology, University of Chennai, Chepakkam Campus, Chennai – 05’ by 30th. For more details, contact on mobile number 94456 28813 or email ‘jsrajan2013@gmail.com’.

Instructions to paper presenters: As the subject matter has been multi-disciplinary, the papers should be theme oriented by the researchers and experts.

• The papers should be specific on the theme chosen.
• Inter-disciplinary approach can be there, but, the respective experts can emphasize their field of study and research.
• The received papers would be scrutinized, processed and selected for presentation.
• The paper presenters are requested to present papers with PPT bringing out their new findings hitherto published so far.
• New, current and updated facts and figures; data and information; interpretations and results are expected.
• No generalizations may be made.
• Already known facts, details and information etc., need not be compiled and repeated.
• Papers should be based on original research of the author with primary sources.
• The final paper should not exceed 10 pages excluding foot notes and references (to be given at the end of the paper).
• 12 points can be used of any font.

The sub-themes are as follows: – considering the multidisciplinary approach and academic cooperation of different departments and experts, the following topics are also considered for the paer presentation.

• the scientific study of archaeology of the earth in all aspects
• sedimentology (study of sediments)
• stratigraphy (study of adding of rocks),
•  their part in identifying the actual qualities of the excavations,
• Comparing and differentiating geoarchaeology and archaeology in the context
• uses of geospatial technologies such as GIS
• Indian maritime contacts with ancient civilizations since c.7000 YBP.
• Palaeolithic to Neolithic cultures and their correlation with the human evolution.
• Literary evidences for the above in the Indian literature.
• Correlation, corroboration and correspondence of the above evidences.

Theme of the seminar: Though the studies on Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil started and its mineral properties in early 19^th century, a complete and holistic understanding of Geoarchaeology and Geo-Microfossil and its formation predictions lacks till date. Most of the study on Geoarchaeology and Geo-Microfossil is centered upon dating the Geoarchaeology and Geo-Microfossil on stylistic grounds, of a particular region without taking all the available evidence. In India the Geoarchaeology and Geo-Microfossil study is usually carried on the basis of formal methods to date them.  Dating the Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil is considered to be the most important aspect in the study of Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil, whereas, other aspects like the meaning and message behind the Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil along with mathematical models in predictions of its age and pigments are usually not given importance because of the lack of insight passed on directly or indirectly from those who made and used the Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil (informed method).

Micro-fossil studies in India: Till date, all the reported Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil from the district is dated back to the prehistoric times on stylistic grounds, other associated finds in and around the Geoarchaeology and Geo-Micro Fossil site has been overlooked. Microorganisms are known to impact aquifers by modifying their rates of dissolution. In the karstic Edwards Aquifer, microbes colonizing the aquifer surfaces enhance the dissolution rates of the host rock. In the oceanic crustal aquifer, the largest aquifer on Earth, microbial communities can impact ocean productivity, seawater chemistry as well as geochemical cycling throughout the geosphere.  The mineral make-up of the rocks affects the composition and abundance of these sub-sea-floor microbial communities present. Through bioremediation, some microbes can aid in decontaminating freshwater resources in aquifers contaminated by waste products.

Archaeological investigations and Chronology: The detailed biological and palaeontological analysis of microfossils in such contexts may be an important source of archaeological data.  By critically reviewing a range of specialized cross-disciplinary analyses, it is shown how microfossils can be used to provenance inorganic artifacts, reconstruct aspects of their manufacturing technology, and infer their function. In Tamilnadu, excavations have been carried on at different sites and our archaeologists have been getting very important evidences. The script has been dated to c.6th cent.BCE and iron usage go back to c.1200 BCE. Thus, the historical chronology changes with the findings. The Poompuhar underwater excavations might reveal new results that might change the existing position also. Here, the geoarchaeology, micro-fossils and other scientific studies could bring results correlating, corroborating and corresponding with the Sangam Tamil literature. In this way, I hope all the concerned departments come together in this seminar to proceed further.

Updating of subjects is necessary: The updating of any subject has been making it current / recent and bringing to the usage with progressed, developed and advanced information and innovation. As the “goods and services” that are used now, get updated, such old “goods and services” get “outdated” and therefore, “update or perish” would come into play. If “publish or perish” has been common among the researchers, “update or perish” has been an axiom among the science and technology users, as the gadgets, instruments, tools, and machinery get outdated day by day. The exact position and condition would come to the academician, syllabus and the subjects. If Indians continue to read old subjects, that too, without any updating, they themselves better understand what would happen. History writers have not thought about progressed, advanced and developed stages of man, society, and nation in spite of many developments have taken place. Therefore, this multidisciplinary approach would pave way for new findings and interpretations.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

20-08-2023

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[1]  Seminar brochure – https://www.unom.ac.in/webportal/uploads/seminar_conference/archaeology_seminar_20230609115934_95211.pdf

[2] The Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan is the central government’s contribution to further the promise held by the rich expanse of India’s state universities. The country’s future lies in empowering these campuses with all that it takes to enhance learning, better research and promote innovation. A centrally sponsored scheme, RUSA understands that sometimes the most important lessons of life are learnt outside the classroom. So whether it is upgrading libraries or computer laboratories, promoting autonomous colleges or clubbing them to consolidate their strength and forming cluster universities, this programme realizes that every institution holds the power to enrich lives through top-class education. With universities, to prepare universe-ready scholars. http://rusa.nic.in/

Teaching of Science and Technology to the students of History or History to the students of science and technology?

Teaching of Science and Technology to the students of History or History to the students of science and technology?

Utility of the subjects and their immediate usage to humanity: Just like tourism, tourism management etc., “History of science and technology”  has been discovered, created and covered under the syllabus and offered as an “elective” subject to the postgraduate students of various disciplines. “History syllabus” has also been formulated to be taught to the students of professional courses like science and technologies, medicine, commerce, management etc., thus, much hype is created with the syllabus to reach and teach history to others.

• No teacher of those subjects proposed such a scheme that they would go and teach “science and technology” to them. 
• So why such exigency arises and for what purpose etc., have also to be analyzed.
• By going through the syllabus, it is clear that the students of professional courses do not gain much by reading such subjects.
• In every subject, mathematics, physics, chemistry, economics, commerce, accounting etc., the origin, progress and development and also the present and future status and scope of them have already been included in the syllabus and taught.
• If fact, their subjects have been and are updated and therefore, such subjects lead to innovative inventions that are immediately converted into parts, accessories, spares, gadgets, appliances, tools and so on useful to humanity.

History of Science and Technology: To write, read, teach and learn “History of Science and Technology”, one need not learn the core subject history, but, the history students cannot understand the “History of Science and Technology,” unless, they are taught from the fundamentals.

• Definitely, all non-history subjects are taught with its origin, which is nothing but history of that subject or perhaps more than that.
• That is how mathematics, physics, chemistry, botany, zoology at one side, and commerce, accounts, management, factory physics, industrial chemistry, bionics, mnemonics[1] etc., on the other side are taught in the schools and universities.
•  Though more and more science and technological subjects increase, there is demand for admission.
• However, recently, the subject “History of Science and Technology” is included for the students of history, archaeology, anthropology, numismatics and related subjects with their own formulated syllabus.
• But, they are taught only as history and not as the “History of Science and Technology.”

BCE 5,4,3,2,1,0,1,2,3,4,5 CE or BCE 5,4,3,2,1,1,2,3,4,5 CE which is correct?: The scientific study of the origin of the subject “History of Science and Technology”, has been different from the simple subject of “History of Science and Technology, for science students. In fact, under such expected conditions, the history teachers cannot teach the “History of Science and Technology”, to them.

• The concept of “zero” and infinity, decimal number system, calendar, planetary system, etc., have been perplexing even for science students, and therefore, how the history students read and understand them, is not known.
• In fact, for chronology, studying eras, dating and other exercises, history teachers have to understand these concepts. 
• Yet, no history expert is worried about “0” year in between BCE 5,4,3,2,1,1,2,3,4,5 CE years, while computing.
• Why the Roman numerals – I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, and X did not have “0” is also not known to them!
• Why the Fibonacci series does not start with “0,” (0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, etc.,) they cannot explain.

These are given only for illustrative purposes and are not exhaustive. Therefore, without knowing “o,” how history teachers would teach about, chronology and related historical developments.

Historical time is linear or cyclic, if “history repeats”!: In science and technology, anything linear or cyclic is understood easily and applied practically, but, in history, nowadays, some historians claim that history is linear and not cyclic. However, having claimed, they have not been able to define exactly how the history has been linear, when “history repeats itself”[2]. Just because, historian has decided take the expression “linear,” he cannot make history “linear.”[3] Again such expertise and elite historians do not bother about the axes and the origin, the zero point. Not only X and Y axes, even Z axis has the other side also.  How then, historians visualize the –ve axes and interpret historical events. Of course, they are totally not bothered as to whether it is 2D or 3D, yet, they prefer to use such terminology in history and historiography.

Using scientific terminology is different from actually working scientifically: Just by using certain terms and expressions, scientific, scientific temper, linear, dynamic, static, etc., at one side and heuristic[4], holistic, euphemistic, epistemological, on the other side, history cannot become scientific or technological, as none of the historical hypotheses, theories and concepts can be tested in the laboratory.

• Earlier, historians used to claim with pride that they should have object in mind, objective mentality and objectivity in dealing with historical facts.
• Now, they assert that they need not have such standards (objectivity).
• Ten historians can write history about the same “object,” and all the ten histories become histories of the object!
• But, science says one is one only; 1+1=2 only, all have accepted universally for thousands of years and it continues.
• Historians and history teachers cannot say in history about anything within a year, 10 years, 100 years… in the same way again and again.
• In India itself,
  • grandfather / grandmother read one history,
  • father / mother read another history,
  • son / daughter read yet another history and
  • now grandson / granddaughter reads still-yet another history!
• This type of history is found in the case of the –
  • Grandfather – Chandragupta Maurya c.324/31 – 297 BCE
  • Father – Bindusara – c.297-273 BCE
  • Grandson – Asoka – c.268-232 BCE

Thus, within three generations, grandfather and father were prehistoric, illiterate and unhistorical also, wheras, the grandson was historic and literate! Again, the grandfather was a Jain, the father Hindu and the grandson a Buddhist! A perfect secular model family!

• In India, there had / have been millions of practices, procedures, and standards followed in day to day life for more than 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000, 5000 YBP and more. They had / have  and are historical only, unlike their “histories” produced or manufactured by the European Company writers and the 1947-Indian history writers.
• Once a history writer becomes ideological, then, no two historians accept and history in India, it always becomes some sort of TV-debate where four persons come and talk about the same subject in four different ways! They come together only to differ from each other and not to come to any conclusion.

Blind Men and an Elephant: The history writers of the European Companies always mention this “cock and bull story”[5] to denigrate Indians for their acumen[6].  Not only non-Indians have read the sources properly, understood the concept and interpret such stories, but also the listeners, readers and others to verify the authenticity of the stories floated about themselves. The irony has been, this “cock and bull ……….story” has been and is still included in the syllabus and the naïve and gullible teachers go on teach and our students read and appreciate the “idiocy” – stupidity, absurdity and silliness of Indians, and believe that they (the Europeans) only taught Indians how to count, learn and dress properly. More and more “Mayos”[7] have been created to spread such “maya,” and when they would be liberated and brought to light from such darkness[8] is not known.

Any subject is offered as an elective, choice or forced: Again teaching history to other disciplines commerce, economics, management, medicine etc., is different from the teaching of “History of Science and Technology” to history students themselves. Just because, history subject is losing its scope in the academics, the history teachers cannot introduce some syllabus and try to impose the same old stuff on the non-history students.

• The utility, benefit and value of the subject also come into play, when any student selects any subject voluntarily, as an elective or for some other reason.
• The students of the “History of Science and Technology” are interested in progress, development and growth in their studies, research and further pursuits.
• Therefore, they may not be interested in what the dynasties fought with each other, rulers invaded other territories or autocrats made the people suffer.
• Even the social, communal, religious, societal, and other aspects and related issues are also irrelevant to them, as long as they divide people based on any factor.

The utility value of the subject: Ultimately, when job, assignment and employment are decided on the certificates and diplomas received, yet, the application of the learned subject in the field decides the fate of the employee, worker or staff.

• A fitter, electrician, plumber and any other technician after getting certificates, has been ready to work in the field, as he has to carry out his job, as otherwise, he will be sent out immediately on the first day, when he is found that he is not able tp work in his field, in spite of having diploma / certificates in his trade or many certificates including other disciplines. “A jack of all trades but master of none”.
• So also a professionally qualified engineer or doctor or any other expert.
• “If you know the job, come and join immediately,” that type of policy is followed today, walk-in interview, selection and appointment order.
• All the certificates and diplomas come thereafter, just for verification.
• If you have 10 certificates, diplomas and degrees in one discipline or 10 different disciplines, but, you cannot work properly, you will be fired, because, the employers want the work to go on.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

12-08-2023

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[1] Mnemonics is the study and development of systems for improving and assisting the memory, A mnemonic device (or memory device, is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval (remembering) in the human memory for better understanding.

[2] Historic recurrence is the repetition of similar events in history. The concept of historic recurrence has variously been applied to overall human history (e.g., to the rises and falls of empires), to repetitive patterns in the history of a given polity, and to any two specific events which bear a striking similarity. Hypothetically, in the extreme, the concept of historic recurrence assumes the form of the Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence, which has been written about in various forms since antiquity and was described in the 19^th century by Heinrich Heine and Friedrich Nietzsche. While it is often remarked that “history repeats itself”, in cycles of less than cosmological duration this cannot be strictly true. In this interpretation of recurrence, as opposed perhaps to the Nietzschean interpretation, there is no metaphysics. Recurrences take place due to ascertainable circumstances and chains of causality.

[3]  In the case of electricity, electronics, computers, digital technology etc., the electric pulse is sinusoidal, digitized to square-shaped pulses and so on. All such processes cannot be brought under any “linear” explanation or interpretation of history.

[4] A heuristic is a mental shortcut commonly used to simplify problems and avoid cognitive overload. Heuristics are part of how the human brain evolved and is wired, allowing individuals to quickly reach reasonable conclusions or solutions to complex problems.

[5] Cock and bull story, far-fetched and fanciful story or tale of highly dubious validity produced by the British county hoteliers / inns to attract their customers.

[6] The Buddhist text Tittha Sutta, Udāna 6.4, Khuddaka Nikaya, contains one of the earliest versions of the story. The Tittha Sutta is dated to around c. 500 BCE, during the lifetime of the Buddha. An alternative version of the parable describes sighted men, experiencing a large statue on a dark night, or feeling a large object while being blindfolded. They then describe what it is they have experienced. In its various versions, it is a parable that has crossed between many religious traditions and is part of Jain, Hindu and Buddhist texts of 1st millennium CE or before. The story also appears in 2^nd millennium Sufi and Baháʼí Faith lore. The tale later became well known in Europe, with 19^th century American poet John Godfrey Saxe creating his own version as a poem, with a final verse that explains that the elephant is a metaphor for God, and the various blind men represent religions that disagree on something no one has fully experienced. The story has been published in many books for adults and children, and interpreted in a variety of ways.

[7] Katherine Mayo, an American lady  and also reportedly a historian wrote a book Mother India (1927) became  a polemical book as it contained many narratives of  grudge, hate and vengeance against Indian – society, religion and culture. Indians do not know any such book has been written about American or European society, religion and culture.

[8] Mohammedan or Mughal court historians always dub that the kafirs (non-believers, non-Mohammedans) of Hindustan were in the jahallia (in the darkness) and they were trying to show nur (light) through jihad (holy war) with their revealed book (al-kitabiya), as the kafirs do not are any revealed scriptures / book..

Recent Advances in South Indian Archaeology – The 2nd International Symposium in memory of Iravatham Mahadevan – 11-03-2023- Animal remains, Ashmound, ash, slag, Iron waste etc (7)

Recent Advances in South Indian Archaeology – The 2^nd International Symposium in memory of Iravatham Mahadevan – 11-03-2023-  Animal remains, Ashmound, ash, slag, Iron waste etc (7)

Mohanty – Manikapatna: an ancient port site in Odisha: Excavation of Manikapatna by D.R. Pradhan yielded the material evidence belonging to an early medieval port having remains of maritime activities. Manikpatna or Manikapatna is an archaeological site in the state of Odisha in eastern India. It has been identified with the medieval port of Chelitalo described by the Chinese pilgrim Hiuen Tsang. The site is located on the sea coast near Brahmagiri which is situated near the left bank of the Bhargavi river, at the northeastern end of the Chilika Lake. Findings indicate trade contacts with many countries. Chinese celadon ware and porcelain have been dated to different centuries, showing prolonged trade. Trade with the Roman Empire is evident from fine greyish-white rouletted pottery, knobbed ware and fragments of the amphora. Other pottery fragments originate from Burma, Siam and Arabian countries. A Sri Lankan coin belonging to the reign of Sahassa Malla has been found dating from the 11th or 12th century CE. The site is named after the nearby village of Manikpatna, which in turn is named after Manika, a milkmaid whom legend says sold yoghurt to Lord Jagannath and Lord Balabhadra when they passed by. The village is home to the Bhabakundalesvara Temple, which has a Shiva Linga made of black chlorite stone as the presiding deity.

Vedachalam – Vattezhutu (read in Tamil): Vattezhuttu and Tamil inscriptions of Varaguna Pandya II: – He was stressing that the first vattezhutu (a syllabic alphabet used for writing Tamil and Malayalam) was used and then during the medieval period, both vattezhutu and Tamil scripts were used, then, mostly, Tamil script was used. Though, he did not tell why such change, modification or transformation took place, he explained several inscriptions of the Pandyas and Cholas.

K. Sridharan – Pattaraiperumpudur excavation: It is situated on the eastern bank of the river Kosathalaiyar and lies on the western side of Tiruvallur, the district headquarter which is about 60 km from Chennai. This place is surrounded by a number of prehistoric sites like Gudiyam, Attirampakkam, Vadamadurai, Neyveli, Parikulam etc. The archaeological mound was found at three places in the village namely anaimedu, nathamedu and irulanthoppu.  In order to examine the potentiality of the archaeological vestiges the excavation was conducted at the place in April 2016. During the course of excavation it has been found that area was accumulating  the rich archaeological vestiges right from prehistoric period to early historical period.  The deposit contain stone tools, different type of potteries, bricks, iron objects, roofing tiles, carnelian beads, shell bangles, terracotta objects, glass beads, copper objects, inscribed sherds (Tamil Bhrami), sherds with graffiti marks, painting potsherds, ivory object, terracotta ring well and other house holding objects in different levels of the excavated trenches. A pragmatic study of the cultural vestiges and the in-situ study of findings gleaned from that the cultural deposit at pattaraipeumbudur can be divided into Stone age period, Iron age period and Early historical period.

Pankaj Goyal- Animal based subsistence strategies at Gottiprolu, a southern Satavahana outpost in Andhra Pradesh’s SPSR Nellore District: Gottiprolu, 2000 years ago, as revealed from archaeological investigations was once apart of the Satavahana Empire which was spread across the modern states of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. It was inhabited by many small to large settlements, the latter displaying urban characteristics and a rich material culture. These included sites such as Peddabankur, Dhulikatta, Kotilingala, and Veerapuram, etc. Some of these sites were fortified (Shastry 1983).During this period, particularly in its coastal region, major economic activities like craft specialization, Indo Roman trade along with Buddhism had flourished (Shastry 1983). One of the factors attributed for the urbanization in this region was the rich fertile alluvial soil of the Krishna and Godavari river basins, which had helped agriculture to develop. While animals may have also contributed to the early historic economy, theirrole is not clear because of the limited faunal studies carried out for sites of this period. Some of the studied sites are Peddabankur (Krishna Shastry 1983), Nagarjunakonda(Nath 1963; Talukder and Pal 2007), Pochampad (Alur 1979a), Yelleshwaram (Alur1979b) and Veerapuram (Thomas 1984).

An interesting feature of the faunal study revealed is the rich animal diversity in existence around Gottiprolu during the Early Historic period. Currently the site islocated adjacent to a reserve forest zone where many of the represented wild animals can be found even today. The representation of a wide range of animals particularly wild buffalo, wild pig, deer, birds, turtles strongly indicates that the climate during the settlement’s occupation was fairly wet and humid supporting a landscape with water bodies and vegetation. Due to which the region was rich in wild life. The Swarnamukhi River and its tributaries had adequate water to support aquatic animals like fish,turtles, molluscs etc. It is this congenial environment with its rich fauna that may have been one of the reasons for establishing the ancient settlement at Gottiprolu. While itstill needs to be determined whether Gottiprolu had functioned as an agricultural, religious, trading, industrial or a military settlement, the faunal study does strongly indicate that it had hosted a fair sized population sustained by a strong animal-based subsistence.

Observation: Incidentally, this paper has already been published in “Heritage: Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies in Archaeology 8.1: 2020” and they have uploaded in “Researchgate” site also[1]. So How he presents the same paper here is not known[2].

J. Soundararajan and K. V. Ramakrishna Rao – The importance of Ashmound found during the Excavations conducted at Valasai, Gudiyatham, Tamilnadu[3]: The Neolithic culture of South India has been invariably connected with ashmounds and Iron Age with the archaeological evidences found in the parts of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. the Ancient History and Archaeology department of University of Madras, found ashmound in 2006 and 2021 at the Valasai village. Earlier, ashmound was reported at Appukkallu and Modur by the TN state archaeology department. Whether the Valasai ashmound can be compared with that of Karnataka, Maharastra and Andhrapradesh; people of Tamilnadu had the similar practices of them; the existing hypotheses and theories of ashmounds; and other issues are discussed, as the Valasai ashmound could be that of non-cowdung nature and that is discussed in this paper taking all factors into consideration and conclusion drawn.

location of the site, side view etc., showing the ash mound…..

Valasai, also known as Modikuppam Valasai (78^o51’53”E; 13^o01’47”N) is a small Village/hamlet in Gudiyattam Block, Kallapadi Panchayath in Vellore District of Tamil Nadu State, India.  In a first of its kind, students attached to the Madras University’s Ancient History and Archaeology department have excavated a neolithic ash-mound during their field training at Sendoor Malai near Gudiyatham[4] in 2021. Though Neolithic ash-mounds have earlier been discovered in other parts of south India, including at Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, this is the first time such a mound is excavated in Tamil Nadu. However, ASI in 1980 had already reported that there were evidences found here for the existence of Neolithic people at Valasai site. A thesis submitted in 2006 by A. Kumar, an alumni of our department, had recorded that there was an extensive mound with multi-cultural phases near Sendoormalai in Vellore district.

ashmound with moulds……..

Iron articles found……..

even holes / porous nature of slag / ferrous oxide waste can be noted……….

Valasai has evidences for Iron smelting and manufacture: The excavation resulted in finding of ferrous presence in the form of ash, slag and broken article. Ferrous slags are produced in different stages of the iron making processes resulting in varying physiochemical properties. Additionally, the rate of cooling of the slag material affects its degree of crystallinity further diversifying its range of properties. Thus, the evidences found are as follows:

1. The site yielded the evidence of Iron smelting activity in the form terracotta pipes and broken pieces of furnace with potsherds like Black-and-Red ware.
2. The excavation has yielded an iron slags from Layer 1 at M.VLS 2.
3. Terracotta blow pipe was also found in M.VLS-3 and 5, and it was used in iron smelting furnace to supply air inside it. It indicates the presence of Iron smelting activities.
4. The excavation has yielded an iron object at M.VLS- 3 and 5. The iron object was found in broken state. A broken knife was noticed from M. VLS-5.
5. The presence of iron slags, iron smelting pipes and iron objects indicate people does have the knowledge of iron smelting technology.
6. The excavation at Modikuppam Valasai has exposed a number of antiquities ranging from the period of Neolithic to Iron Age period. The antiquities include lithic objects, terracotta objects, TC beads, burnishing tool, grinding stones, Iron objects etc.

Here, the Valasai ashmound might thus differ with others with the metallic nature of content. Thus, the Iron furnace broken parts, terracotta pipes, Iron slag, broken Iron object etc., prove the Iron smelting activities and the waste, slag and powder / ash found could be related to Iron  (ferrous oxide) conglomerates with sand etc. the 74,000 YBP volcanic ash ad that of 3000-1500 BCE “ashes” have to be contrasted and differentiated.

Conclusion: In view of the above archaeological excavations, investigation and interpretation of excavated artefacts comparing with that of others, the following details are drawn out and submitted as concluding points:

1. Valasai, the Neolithic site has traces of ashmound, but, it is related to Iron Age period and thus, could be that of Iron smelting.
2. “Sendoor malai” could refer to the mound made of red soil with ferrous oxide content. The soil of the town is constituted with gravel clay mixed with sand soft rock. The eastern portion of the town has soft rock and red soil, red loam soil or red ferruginous variety both sandy and loamy. There is an hillock called “Sendukkarai Hill” in this portion.
3. Iron ash, furnace, slag and related items have been recovered to correlate and corroborate such investigation and interpretation.
4. The ceramic industry also vouchsafe the high temperatures handling capacity of the people, furnace and fuel materials, later reduced to ashes.
5. Cow / Cattle dung cake known as “Varatti,” had / has been a common man fuel producing temperatures of high order, depending upon the usage. These cakes were used in the furnaces used for the manufacture of clay articles, ceramics, beads, glass, metallic objects etc. Nowadays,, machines are available for making dung cakes[5].
6. Even today, the red soil is used widely for pottery making, brick manufacture and construction work for its ferrous, ferruginous and binding nature.
7. As elephant presence has been here, whether their dung available in huge quantities could be a source for the “ashmound” can also be studied[6].

Santanu Vaidhya – Socio-economic perspectives of Vidarba Megaliths:.. The finding of new sites has opened a new arena in study of the Early Iron Age. It can be seen as follows: a) The observation of Vaidya (2014) that there are and have to be many more sites with Early Iron Age habitation and also that the habitation and burials form one single cultural entity is supported. Hence, it can be said that there are settlements present in areas rich in resource like alluvium, pasture and iron ore.

b) Malli excavations (Sontakke 2014a) as discussed earlier have brought out some new aspects of the Early Iron Age such as the presence of a different burial architecture, negligible burial goods and also the importance of internal burial architecture more than the interments. Recent explorations have yielded only solitary evidence of menhir from Sasara. Menhirs are not very common in the Nagpur region, except at Nagbhir and Umred. But even the last mentioned two places are near the Wainganga River. Even at Malli and surroundings menhirs are noticed (Sontakke 2014a). Thus it can be said that this burial typology was confined probably to the Wainganga proper and not in the Nagpur region and further west. Also it seems that the burials differed in ideology from the Nagpur region, since at Malli not many burial goods were recovered as in the Nagpur region burials (Sontakke 2014a). Again this suggests the presence of a different burial type like menhir and cist in this region. Sasara and its surroundings therefore make up a promising place for further probing and investigations.

Observation: Here also, it is noted that the same or similar paper has already been published and appearing in the Bulletin of the Deccan college and also internet[7]. He might have presented here with slight changes of the same site and details[8].

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

14-03-2023.

---

[1] Deshpande-Mukherjee, A., Goyal, P., Sreelakshmi, T., Rajesh, M., Veeraraghavan, N., Krishna, S., & Vinodh, N. Past Faunal Diversity and Animal Usage Revealed at Gottiprolu, A Southern Satavahana Outpost in SPSR Nellore District of Andhra Pradesh. Heritage: Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies in Archaeology 8.1: 2020.

[2]https://www.researchgate.net/publication/359710811_Past_Faunal_Diversity_and_Animal_Usage_Revealed_at_Gottiprolu_A_Southern_Satavahana_Outpost_in_SPSR_Nellore_District_of_Andhra_Pradesh

[3]  K. V. Ramakrishna Rao in December 2022 itself sent two papers one joint paper with J. Soundararajan and another individual, both accepted, CV and detals asked, invited, but suddenly, K. V. Ramakrishna Rao  – name removed, he was invited to attend the conference as “participant,” for the best reasons only known to the organizers. Is it also “Recent advances in South Indian Archaeology” or not – is not known.

[4] Incidentally, the Kudatini ashmound, which sits astride a pass through a north– south spur of the Sandur Hills, was one of the first described by colonial surveyors, resemble “Sendoor malai,” Sendoor hills.

[5] cow dung processing machines such as –

1. Cow dung dewatering machine
2. Cow dung cake machine
3. Cow dung dia making machine
4. Agarbathi making machine –  are available in the market.

[6] Elephant dung produced has been enormous – as an elephant could produce 100 kgs dung per day and more than 40 MTs in a year. Thus, even, if ten elephants herd was there, 400 MTs dung would have been deposited in that area. Had it been disposed off periodically at a place by way of buring with other waste, it coud have also formed part of the “ashmound.”

[7] Vaidya, S., Abbas, R., Sontakke, V., & Willis, M. (2015). Recent Findings on the Early Iron Age in the Bhandara District and Wainganga Basin, Vidarbha. Bulletin of the Deccan College Research Institute, 75, 85-92.

[8] https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/49933029/Arch-75-07_85-92_Vaidya_etal-libre.pdf?1477646966=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DRECENT_FINDINGS_ON_THE_EARLY_IRON_AGE_IN.pdf&Expires=1678901644&Signature=SxxBHBzZ3vRt9eiwkRgUCXgLH~3YszAdK2WcrSBBU1A5xHHeNRnHxWAt2-cv8oYMqWEYNyQgGPn8nsgFR0AFDEJ1ZfOwRQ~ASf1dTJdd-5oZrcqFeBJJxQmqc5DZdeBItJ6MMeoA47OY9pyx3EjCP-eS1lNa6s2V32VDnHha6RSMPEx7dvKxLQ8pinjO4W~HdyTbDwS2jLzI8pBY7QyS-3CCNJGJm0GgdhXSCtsH9Yo78M9SQoaWceBTx1Uk-iHcoVI~v8Wnu3iPE8aLxN-NbiQbYp6-pmLAfC0E8rjwxhaUUHzOP0eM6o2csWy52Gc3w9EI2k0eZ2SZO6kI96JSkw__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA

The “National Seminar on Cataloguing, editing and Publication of Ancient Indian Manuscripts on Science and Technology” held on March 25th 28th 2019 at Bangalore [2]

The “National Seminar on Cataloguing, editing and Publication of Ancient   Indian Manuscripts on Science and Technology” held on March  25^th  28^th 2019 at Bangalore [2]

5.15 to 5.40 pm prof. Khincha, Ex-Chairman at Manipal University Jaipur : keynote address given by Kincha. “Though Thatachariar invited me to present keynote address, I do not know how I am fit to be here to do so,” thus, he started and went to point out that Jaina manuscripts of 1400 years old are available. Preservation of manuscripts started long back. There a manuscripts available in the libraries of Vatican London etc. ow many manuscripts have been digitized and useful for further benefit is not known. More digitization means more funding. Digitization should give information for carrying out research s that it is useful. Advanced image techniques can be used for digitization. Charred mss, where indentations were not visible, such techniques could be used. Archimedes project[1] is used to decipher manuscripts…When characters are recognized, then, they can be subjected to machine translation. Manuscript is one time documentation, whereas, digitization can be done again and again with new techniques.

Subject of digital humanities. Digital archives of India[2] is carried on at IIT, Kharagpur. Whether these manuscripts are preserved in the manuscript form or digitized form, their usage is important. Society has to adjust with technology. Nearly 30 years were taken to adjust with the introduction of sewing machine.

5.45 to 6.05 pm – Sri Manjunatha:  Sri Manjunatha has been working with Patanjali group of Industries. He has been visiting many places and collecting manuscripts. He saw 9000 manuscripts gathering dust in the Oriental Manuscript Library, Mysuru, 6000 in Mysore palace shed, 60,000 in Banaras Hindu University, he also purchased manuscripts for research at Patanjajil Research Institute, where, 45,000 manuscripts were there. He asked the British library for taking copies, but, they refused. He got manuscript for curing cancer, but, he would not tell the source. They have developed medicine for Dengu fever. And HIV aso, they have medicine, but, the patient has to come to Haridwar and they give medicine free. They have manufactured medicine with the combination of Arjuna rishta [pathimara] with other Ayurvedic formulations, that would clear all blocks to heart. Baba Ramdev wants all research should be done in Sanskrit only, so that the westerners could not steal our knowledge, even, if they want to do that, they have to learn Sanskrit to copy. In that way Sanskrit lives. Baba is ready to buy manuscripts.

6.10 to 6.39 pm Lakhsmi Thatacharya: In his presidential speech, Lakshmi Thatacharya pointed out that it is very important to extract information from the manuscripts. To some extent in shastra University, the IIT students are made to take interest in manuscripts, as they have one paper on manuscriptology. In Kanchi University, Computer science students are reciting Sanskrit mantras, but, to what extent, they are interested in Sanskrit is not known. When he was in MIT, he asked the experts to give importance to linguistics, while researching in the recognition of characters etc. For digitization of one manuscript man years are required, if that is the case, for digitization of millions of manuscripts, the Kaliyuga is not enough to complete the job. Dating of manuscripts is done paleographical method. C 14 can also be used for dating. M.S.Dwarakadass is interested in manufacturing new alloys with the combinations given in the manuscripts. Manufacture of several alloys have been tried.  Trinetra…….is mentioned. For alloying, it is mentioned ruruka has to be added. It is nothing but bone of ass / deer. So it was also added and tried, but, e cud get only 40% success.  There have been manuscripts on stones. In one manuscript, it is given that when juice of two herbs were applied on the surface of stones, the surface becomes soft and one may write / inscribe easily and the next morning, it becomes hard. Definitely, it is good method.  There are manuscripts to control different types of fevers, however, they have not been deciphered and encoded completely to distinguish the fevers and medicines mentioned for cure.

6.40 to 6.55 pm – Sanjay Singhal:  Sanjay Singhal from Jodhpur, It and software business told his experience at the World Sanskrit Conference held at Vancouver, where 500 participated 300 from India and 200 from other countries. When parallel paper reading sessions were going on, Indian delegates were attending to Indian paper presentation session and foreigners to their session. In other words, there was a divide between these two expert groups. Western scholarship does not respect Indian scholarship. Yet, there was none to question, when foreigners were presenting papers, even, belittling Sanskrit. Thus, there has been a great divide between the Indian and non Indian Sanskrit scholarship. Thus, the inauguration function was over.

Why many people, organizations and institutions engage in the same job?: As a researcher and attending hundreds of seminars, conferences and workshops for the last 40 years, I could find that many people, organizations and institutions engage in the same job of collecting, Cataloguing, editing and Publication of Ancient   Indian Manuscripts on many subjects and evidently including that of Science and Technology, as many deal with such subjects. In Bangalore itself, dozens of organizations have been engaged in doing the same work[3]. Thus, one news go like this[4], “Thousands of ancient medical manuscripts, including several written on palm leaves centuries ago, are now available at the click of a button thanks to a decade long effort by researchers at Bengaluru’s TransDisciplinary University (TDU). Thousands of ancient medical manuscripts, including several written on palm leaves centuries ago, are now available at the click of a button thanks to a decade long effort by researchers at Bengaluru’s TransDisciplinary University (TDU).”In spite of the fact that the invading hoards looted, burned, destroyed and carried away crores of manuscript, that still, 50,000,000 mss are available proves the fact that Indians have been recording their past in the mass for many years, as these are only copies or reprinted books of the old ones.

27-03-2019- Mss seminar -N. V. Prasada Rao, M. J. Nagarajan, H. S. Sudharshan

27-03-2019- Mss seminar -N. V. Prasada Rao, T. N. Sudharshan. M. J. Nagarajan, H. S. Sudharshan

27-03-2019- Mss seminar -audience – centre from the stage

27-03-2019- Mss seminar -my bag.audience. LHS

View of the audience RHS from the stage

Academic Sessions Session 1 – 27-03-2019: 9.30 to 11.00 AM: The technical session actually started on 27^th with the paper presentation of the following: with the Chairperson: Prof. Ch. N V Prasada Rao,  Retd. Prof. AP chaired the session and theme was “Manuscripts on Medical Sciences”.

Sl. No. Name of the Presenter Topic 1 T. N. Sudharshan, Infinity Foundation, Bangalore AIyush – AI enabling the Āyurveda Ecosystem 2 Mr. M. J. Nagarajan, Independent researcher, Chennai The Manuscripts attributed to Siddhas and their Critical Study 3 H. S. Sudhsrshan, Research Associate, Centre for Ancient Histor, Jain University, Bangalore. A Critical study Vridda-gargiya-jyotisha based on manuscripts Sudharsan stressed upon the AI enabling the Āyurveda Ecosystem. The 7th World Ayurveda Congress to be held in Kolkata during December 1–4, 2016 has very apt focal theme ‘Strengthening the Ayurveda Ecosystem’. It is very heartening to note that eminent biomedical scientist Dr Soumya Swaminathan, Secretary, Department of Health Research and Director General, Indian Council of Medical Research has accepted to be Chairperson of the Organizing Committee. Already, she and AYUSH Secretary Shri Ajit Sharan have initiated AYUSH-ICMR Mission for collaborative scientific research. This is very promising example of integrative approach where confluence of traditional and modern systems of knowledge can strengthen the Ayurveda ecosystem to shape the future global health. The establishment of AYUSH independent ministry has a commitment towards strengthening the AYUSH ecosystem. Health problems involving chronic diseases, non communicable diseases etc, there is a scope for complementary as well as preferential choice of any system including Ayurveda. There are a large number of clinical setups in national/state Ayurveda institutions, but the quality publication outcome is low. In the present article, being a scientist and science manager, I have just summarized my opinion to strengthen and growth of Ayurveda. Development of special validation methods for Ayurveda research based on Ayurveda principle is an hour of need. Randomized controlled trials on the use of new innovations are needed in Ayurveda. To strengthen Ayurveda, interdisciplinary approach may prove beneficial. Value addition based synergy and partnerships with ICMR/DBT/DST/ICAR would be beneficial for the growth of Ayurveda[5].   © K. V. Ramakrishna Rao 30-03-2019

[1] The Archimedes Project aims to develop model interactive environments for scholarly research on the history of mechanics and engineering from antiquity to the Renaissance. It is designed to integrate research and knowledge dissemination in new ways and to serve as a proof-of-concept project for open digital libraries on topics in the history of science.  http://archimedes.fas.harvard.edu/

[2] http://nationalarchives.nic.in/ and http://www.ndpp.in/digitalarchive/

[3] Economic Times, From Palm leaves to Computers – ancient medical scripts turn digital, By Bharat Joshi, ET Bureau, Updated: Jun 30, 2016, 10.34 AM IST.

[4] https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/from-palm-leaves-to-computers-ancient-medical-scripts-turn-digital/articleshow/52984142.cms

[5] Katoch, V. M. “Planning action for strengthening the ecosystem for Ayurvedic research.” Journal of Ayurveda and integrative medicine 9.4 (2018): 248-249.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0975947618310210

[6]  Susarla, Sai, Parag Deshmukh, and K. Gopinath. Architectural Considerations for Scalable Indic Document Analytics.,

[7] http://cse.iitkgp.ac.in/resgrp/cnerg/sclws/papers/susarla.pdf.

[8] Sarvadevabhatla, Ravi Kiran, and R. Venkatesh Babu. Category-Epitomes: Discriminatively Minimalist Representations for Object Categories. arXiv preprint arXiv:1502.00082, 2015.

[9] Sarvadevabhatla, Ravi Kiran, Sudharshan Suresh, and R. Venkatesh Babu. “Object category understanding via eye fixations on freehand sketches.” IEEE Transactions on Image Processing 26.5 (2017): 2508-2518.

[10] https://arxiv.org/pdf/1703.06554.pdf

The “National Seminar on Cataloguing, editing and Publication of Ancient Indian Manuscripts on Science and Technology” held on March 26th 28th 2019 at Bangalore [1]

The “National Seminar on Cataloguing, editing and Publication of Ancient   Indian Manuscripts on Science and Technology” held on March  26^th  28^th 2019 at Bangalore [1]

From Chronology seminar to manuscript seminar in Bangalore: After attending the two day National seminar held at Bangalore on February 18^th and 19^th 2019, we received a brochure through e-mail. Not only the brochure, even the contents had been also attractive. As the theme and approach were very attractive for researchers, immediately, we decided to attend. Above all, it is to be held in the ISKCON temple complex. I thought, it is the suitable place for the conduct of the seminar, as, Sri Krishna has been the historical personality of Indian history with the start of Kali Era that is the “sheet anchor of Indian history.” In spite of short notice, we could prepare papers, as we have had details ready. As I have been researching for the last 40 years, with data and information available with me, I could prepare papers, immediately and send to the organizers.  I booked tickets also informing them.

First experience at ISKCON, Bangalore (26-03-2019): This is the second time, I am visiting ISKCON, Bangalore. Twenty years back, I came to the temple for darshan. This time, I came as a delegate to present paper. We reached ISKCON temple complex and accommodated at room no.211 by 2.00 pm. The reception asked us to take food coupon and have food, as it closes by 2.30 pm. We had food there and had some rest after discussing the papers to be presented. I was really happy to be there at the place of Sri Krishna, whom I consider as the Lord of Chronology, HOD of Indian history and the greatest historiographer of India, that is Bharath, and perhaps, of the whole world during the 3100 BCE period. I was enquiring about the venue and the program, but, the persons at the reception were telling that some volunteers would come to inform! As none came and it was already 5,00 pm, I contacted and she [Samskriti Foundation representative] responded that she was not feeling well, …………………………….the program had already started, tried to contact, but, could get line and so on. Anyway, we proceeded to the hall and it was nearby only. The “National Seminar on Cataloguing, editing and Publication of Ancient   Indian Manuscripts on Science and Technology” was inaugurated at the auditorium, ISKCON, Bangalore on March 26^th evening and it was funded by the National Mission f0r Manuscript. Dr Alwar was compeering the proceedings. The following few paras tell the information about the theme of the seminar[1].

Indian manuscripts distributed and available countries: The Indian Scientific heritage has been extremely productive. India has one of the largest collections of Scientific manuscripts of any civilization in the world. While there is no precise enumeration of the number of manuscripts, estimates vary widely, putting it in the region of 20000 to 100,000 manuscripts. Several of these manuscripts are now in institutions such as – Oriental Manuscripts Libraries, Indological Research Institutions, Universities, Mutts and Archives and many are still in private collections. Manuscripts are also available in foreign libraries in U.K., France, Germany & USA and in Asian countries like, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Burma, Bhutan, China (Tibet), Thailand. Unfortunately there is no detailed and accurate data about the number, extent and distribution of the Scientific manuscripts of India. The presently available published Scientific texts, which are in contemporary use, represent less than 2% of the Scientific literature that is available in the form of manuscripts. However, as of today, there is no proper methodology to know or verify the names, authors or any other details of manuscripts that exist on the topic of Science and Technology in ancient India.

The Samskriti Foundation: The Samskriti Foundation, Mysore, is organizing this national seminar. It has, at present, embarked on a project to collect, collate and present information about a bibliography of manuscripts exclusively dealing with Science and technology. So far it has collected and listed information about 7,000 numbers of such manuscripts, which turned out to be a very meticulous, pain-staking task.  Thus, the Foundation has a unique database of ancient manuscripts dealing with Science and Technology (S & T) of Ancient India.

The Problem dealing with the manuscripts available: Though the Foundation has collected and prepared an electronic database of ancient manuscripts dealing with Science and Technology of Ancient India, there is still a long way to go, as these Manuscripts have to be procured from various institutions, University libraries and personal collections. Further the following steps have to be undertaken:

1. Cleaning etc of the Manuscripts and making them ready for digitization
2. Digitization of the concerned Manuscripts
3. Deciphering the Manuscripts
4. Transcribing the Manuscripts
5. Editing the Manuscripts
6. Preparing English Translation / regional languages translation etc. in collaboration with scientists / technocrats connected with the concerned field.
7. Making other value editions
8. Publishing the Manuscripts

To undertake the above tasks, the active collaboration of scholars and scientists / technologists alike is very much necessary. This is because, unlike while dealing with Manuscripts on literature, philosophy etc., Manuscripts on S & T contain many technical terms that even scholars who are familiar with the particular language would not be able to interpret properly. Apart from this, these exist several other problems in deciphering / interpreting / editing Manuscripts belonging to many new areas like ancient geography, alchemy, earth sciences and such other subjects.  Therefore, there is a dire need to unearth and train a new breed of persons who are ‘scientist-manuscriptologists’. As of today, there are not many scientist-manuscriptologists who can undertake such tasks and bring to light the ancient Manuscripts on S & T of yore which can bring to light the expertise of our forefathers in various fields of S & T.

The solution envisaged: To overcome the above problem, it is proposed to bring together expert scientists and technologists on one side and expert manuscriptologists on the other on a common platform and make them interact with each other so that there can be a healthy exchange of ideas and concepts that can help in taking the task of deciphering / interpreting / editing Manuscripts belonging to many new areas like ancient geography, alchemy, earth sciences and such other subjects dealing with S & T. The proposed seminar specifically wishes to address and make considerable headway in solving the problems mentioned above.

The purpose of the seminar: The seminar will be organized in such a way that an exclusive session will be devoted for a particular con temporarily relevant field of science and technology and experts in that particular field will speak on particular unpublished, valuable Manuscripts that is concerned with that particular field. For example, there will be an exclusive session for unpublished Manuscripts on the subject of ‘Mathematics’ and in that session, experts on Mathematics will speak on deciphering, publication  etc. of unpublished, useful Manuscripts on Mathematics and their utility. Similarly separate sessions will be schedules for other important subjects. Of course, it will be impossible to deal with all such subjects in a very short span of three days. However, the topics will be prioritized based on contemporary relevance and the sessions will be held in a highly sophisticated manner. The seminar will be a pioneering one, since, as far as information available at present, such a seminar for deciphering / interpreting / editing Manuscripts belonging to many new areas like ancient geography, alchemy, earth sciences and such other subjects dealing with S & T has not been organized so far by any agency.

 

ISKCON guest house

Samskriti Foundation had already organized a National Seminar on “Application of Information Technology for conservation, editing and publication of Manuscripts” on the 20^th, 21^st and 22^nd of January 2013, at Multivision Theatre, ISKCON, Harekrishna Hill, Rajajinagar, Bangalore, with support from the National Mission for Manuscripts, IGNCA, Govt. of India[2]. Thus, it is evidet that, this is also a similar seminar conducted after six years. Coming to the current seminar, as mentioned above, we reached the hall “Multi-vision theatre”, the program already started. As usual, I started taking photographs and sat down.

When I was just entering, I took this photograph……………..

Pranava Khular, Manjunatha, Khinchi, M. S. Lakshmi Thathachariyar

26-03-2019- Mss seminar -inauguration-audience

6-03-2019- Mss seminar -inauguration-audience.2

26-03-2019- Mss seminar -inauguration-audience.3

5.00 to 5.14 pm – Sri Pranav Khular, Joint Secreary, Ministry of Culture: Vajpayee commented that if all the manuscripts were many IVCs and Dwarakas might be discovered. Launching the Mission, the Prime Minister Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee said[3], “…the NMM is different from the other missions undertaken till now.  In this the benefits are neither direct nor visible….I believe that the NMM will bring to light many more Mohenjodaros and Dwarakas.”

Referring to the technological aspect of the Mission, the Prime Minister noted that modern science asks proof for claims and this very science (modern technology) is providing tools for resurrecting these proofs of our glorious past.  Shri Vajpayee highlighted three aspects of the mission: since 70 per cent of the manuscripts are in Sanskrit, the teaching and learning of the language will have to be further promoted, several institution that are already working in the field will have to be associated with the Mission and finally, a huge awareness campaign has to be undertaken to encourage individual custodians of manuscripts to come forward and give them to the Mission. The National Mission for Manuscript has been given several extensions and now it has been extended up to 31^st  March 2020. Work has to be done, as there was no pace in it.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

30-03-2019

[1] Taken from their brochure and their website: http://www.samskrti.org/; http://samskrti.org/seminar/ ;

Email: samskrti@hotmail.com

[2] https://samskrti.org/seminars-and-conferences/

[3] https://namami.gov.in/about-us-0

The Fourth session of Telangana History Congress held at the Kakatiya University on January 27th and 28th 2019 [2]

The Fourth session of Telangana History Congress held at the Kakatiya University on January 27^th and 28^th 2019 [2]

1. S. S. Seshan’s paper continues………………………………………………..

Judicial Enquiry Commission: The Resident, instituted a Commission of Enquiry consisting of 6 members; three were nominated by the Resident and the other three were the nominees of the Nizam’s administration. The Commission finally found that Mubarez was engaged in a conspiracy with the Nawab of Kurnool and several others with a view to overthrow the Nizam and declare himself as the ruler and also to bring an insurrection against the British.

Network of spies[1]: The Enquiry Commission became central in unearthing the contemplated insurrection of the Nawab of Kurnool. There was a letter written by Mubarez to the Nawab of Kurnool that was intercepted by the British agents. Mubarez in that letter had spelled out his plans for the final assault on the British requesting the Nawab to dispatch the needed arms for such an attack. If only that letter has reached the Nawab, and had he acted, the Enquiry Commission felt, “the results would have been very disastrous”. The letter was concealed in an amulet and was to be delivered to the Nawab of Kurnool. But on the way to Kurnool, fearing the capture by the British, Muhammad Khan the spy, tied the amulet to the hand of an old beggar woman living in a sarai, where he himself took shelter in the guise of a traveller. The amulet was recovered by the guards while combing the area and thus the entire conspiracy came to light. The letter thus brought to light the role of the Nawab of Kurnool, in the conspiracy against the English. The British at Madras, immediately sent a large military contingent to deal with Kurnool. The Nawab’s armies were defeated in October, 1839 and the Nawab was deported to Tiruchirapalle (formerly Trichinopoly in English), where he was imprisoned and Kurnool was taken over by the Company administration. Rasool Khan was murdered by one of his own servants in the prison. The Enquiry Commission also felt that Mubarez, apart from being a hand in glove with the Nawab of Kurnool, also tried to spread sedition among the Muslim sepoys stationed in Secunderabad. As a result, Mubarez had to spend the rest of his life as a prisoner in the Golconda fort till he died on June 25, 1854[2].

27-09-2019- after lunch session – Dr Raja Reddy

Raja Reddy on the richest Nizam of the world: Osman Ali Khan, Mukarram Jahs grandfather, was crowned the eighth Nizam of Hyderabad to become the richest ruler in the world with an inheritance worth US $2 billion, lost a wife to AIDS and turned his incredible fortune to dust in the Australian outback, all in the course of 30 years.

 

Now a balding 72-year-old Mukarram Jah, leads a secret life, with very few people in his own neighbourhood in Turkey aware of his existence or his whereabouts. Mukarram Jah was anointed the Nizam of Hyderabad and Berar, the richest and most powerful state in the sub-continent. It is said that Mukarram could trace his lineage back 34 generations on his fathers side to the First Caliph of Islam, Abu Bakr. According to Zubrzycki, Mukarram Jahs grandfather Osman Ali Khan, was once described as being richer than all the Fords, Rockefellers and Morgans put together. Ironically, says Zubrzycki, Jah was short of cash. There were very few rupees in the kitty to pay maintenance for the 14,792 relatives, harems with 42 ageing concubines, hundreds of illegitimate children, and 14,000 staff consisting of retainers, guards, cooks and other employees his grandfather had been caring for.

Helen Simmons asked Mukarram for a divorce but was soon diagnosed as being HIV-positive, like her homosexual friends. She died of AIDS in 1989, the first Australian woman to do so, at the age of 41, but Mukarram was cleared of the virus after tests in Switzerland. Nizam used to send convicts to Andaman and Nicobar islands and the British collected transport and maintenance charges from him. For more details on the Nizam with photographs etc., read here[3].

5.00 to 7.00 pm – Y. Sudharshan Rao: He delivered the Prof Mukkamala Radhakrishna Sarma Memorial lecture. He was talking with philosophical sting and much abstract issues, the students obviously did not like. Based on Benard Lewis book, he started interpreting as to how, “history – is remembered, recovered and invented” in the context of Telangana. He concluded[4], “Again, there was a great spurt in writing history of Telugu people when the linguistic states were formed. Regional histories and local histories are pursued with cultural, social and political themes. While mainstream Indian historiography has changed its perspective from national to Marxist, the regional histories continued to be biographic, sectional and local. With the recent division of the state into Telangana and Andhra Pradesh sharing Telugu population, perhaps, the entry of third genre of ‘invented history’ as rampant in the West may have to wait in our regional sphere”.

27-09-2019- Memorial lecture.VIPs stand together

In fact, they were busy with their cellphones, but he continued for two hours. As I used to listen to many-many such memorial lectures, I find that this has become a ritual as the speaker goes on talks or reads from his paper without caring for others. And  mostly, the listeners were forced to sit and listen to him, of course, 50% of them would be sleeping also. Later, he himself expressed that his speech was taken by the students differently!

7.00 to 8.30 pm – Cultural programme: The troupe depicted in an emotional way, “The origin of Telangana state,” projecting K. Chandrasekhara Rao since his early days, as to how he spearheaded the movement. However, too much “separatist” ideology injected in their narrative made others uncomfortable. Particularly, those who come from other states might not find any difference between the Telugu speaking people of  both states.

The second day 28-01-2019 proceedings – 10.00 to 10.42 am: Jaikishan gave a lengthy presentation on iron, steel, paper etc of Telangana. He claimed that he was the only archaeo-metallurgist doing research in industrial archaeology etc. First he was telling about the iron and steel manufactured in India that were famous in the medieval period. He was telling the story of “Damascus sword,” how it roused the interests of the Europeans to test for anti-rustic properties etc. He pointed out based on Pliny as to how Romans decided not to buy Indian steel and so on. He was mentioning about “kotla” paper manufactured in the villages of Telangana that was used by the Moghuls and also nexported to London. Most the paper manufacturers had been Muslims. The ingredients for paper manufacture were soaked and kept for 24-30 hours and then used for rolling. When I pointed out that he did not mention that Indian steel as “Wootz” and also about Dr S. Kalyanaraman who has done exhaustive research in these areas, he tried to manage and told that he knew him and he has all the books of him. Meanwhile, somebody intervened and said that he had been an expert in the field and he could talk hours together on the subject!

10.53 to 11.08 am – Kurra Jitendra Babu: He asserted that, “The papers presented so far has been useless…” Yesterday, one expert talked more than one-and-half hours and when the students were asked  what they has understood, they replied “nothing…..,” and some commented that, “…….they could have gone for a movie………………” Then, he tried show that Indians knew everything before westerners. Neils Bohr and others were indebted to Acharya Nagarjuna, Einestein dedicated his work to Thikkanna for his E = mc², and so on. He went on to assert[5], that “Sanskrit itself is a refinement of different types of Prakrit used by the different people of India…The very fact that there are no Sanskrit manuscripts found in Kalinga kingdom (modern day Odisha) is evidence enough to say that Sanskrit is not the linguistic ancestor of Telugu…… No research is being done to prove or disprove these new theories,……..unless the material is available to scholars of both the States there will be no more research”. Itappears that he has been voicing in this way at other places also[6]. The Telangana dancers have been depicted in the gopuram of Big temple Tanjore. Giriraja kavi’s grand son of Tyagaraja went to Thanjavur and thus, they were also influenced by the people of Telangana[7].  And thus, he tried to glorify Telanga for origin of everything. While Pali was the linguistic ancestor of Telugu spoken in Andhra region, a form of Prakrit was the linguistic ancestor of Telugu spoken in Telangana, he said.

I thank my friend Sudhakar Kundur for providing the following four photographs of my presentation

KVR presenting paper – locating Telangana- on “Kunjarakunjadesa of South India and its connection with the South East Asian Civilization”

 

11.00 to 11.30 am – K. V. Ramakrishna Rao: I resented my paper on “Kunjarakunjadesa of South India and its connection with the South East Asian Civilization,” and located it at the border of Andhra and Kalinga with the following conclusion:

1. The Changgal inscription proves the close, well-connected maritime trade contacts of the importers-exporters one side and the warriors, religious groups on the other side.
2. The language used, grantha script applied and the grammar-syntax exploited prove that the migration of such knowledge transfer must have taken place at least 50-100 years to attain such status far away from India. However, such transfer must have taken place natural, peaceful and acceptable to the local people.
3. Kunjarakunjadesa expression has been used associating with elephants, elephant like wrestlers and great architects. As the elephants have been used significantly connected with forest-wooden industry, building temples and other secular structures, such elephant connected experts were adorned with titles of Kunjaramallar, Kunjaramallan, Kunjaramalla Peruntacchan and so on.
4. Elephant (Kunjaram) and dwarf (Kunjaran) have been associated with Siva, as here, Agastya was associated with the building of temples on the hill and creator of Lingam, acting as Dhaksha, Architect, Brahma, or Viswakarma.
5. Cholas engaged elephant army, as they required for battles and as well as for infrastructure development.
6. The Andhra-Kalinga area had been centrally located on the Coromandel Coast between the Sri Lanka and numerous islands and Bengal and beyond, the Cholas wanted to control and exploit the area strategically. The erection of victory pillar on the Mahendragiri hill can also be noted in the context.
7. The Cholas knew evidently, the Sailendras’ connection with Sumatra / Java / Kedah and also with the Palas and the Chinese, and hence had cardial relationship initially, through the Buddhists (Vihara constructed at Nagappattinam).
8. As during the first centuries, the Palavas had been so active in those areas, they had all sorts of experts migrated already there and settled down. Here, Kalinga-Andhra coastal areas played a crucial role.
9. The Satavahanas and the Pallavas were dominating the coastal areas and as well as maritime areas till the first centuries ton 7^th-8^thcenturies and the Cholas thereafter till 13^th century.
10. Thus, the study of Kunjarakunjadesa, clarifies the cultural, commercial, religious and maritime contacts of the Coromandel Coast with that of SEA countries during the first centuries to the medieval period.

KVR responding to querries

There were querries and I answered.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

02-03-2019

My PPT presentation

I thank my friend Sudhakar Kundur for providing the above four photographs of my presentation

[1] K S S Seshan Mubarez-ud-Daulah’s era: Of passion, rebellion and conspiracy, in The Hindu, Hyderabad, JUNE 10, 2017 15:32 IST; UPDATED: JUNE 10, 2017 15:32 IST.

[2] https://www.thehindu.com/society/history-and-culture/mubarez-ud-daulahs-era-of-passion-rebellion-and-conspiracy/article18955189.ece

[3] His Exalted Highness Prince Mukarram Jah Bahadur, 8th Nizam of Hyderabad- Interviews and feature stories from American, Australian, British and Indian newspapers and magazines, http://cvxmelody.50webs.com/

[4] Based on the paper circulated to the delegates of THC on 27-01-2019 evening in the hall.

[5] The Hindu, Call for common Telugu research centre, by G. Venkataramana Rao Vijayawada:, AUGUST 19, 2014 00:21 IST; UPDATED: MAY 08, 2017 12:00 IST

[6] https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Vijayawada/call-for-common-telugu-research-centre/article11205607.ece

[7] Giriraja was born in Kakarla village, Cumbum taluk in Prakasham district (AP) has produced many of the important cultural figures of South India. Among the greatest of those was Tyagaraja, whose mother was a daughter of Giriraja Kavi. Giriraja Kavi played a major role in influencing the formative years of his celebrated grandson Tyagaraja. He was instrumental in securing a place at court for his grandson, a position that Tyagaraja soon abjured. It is to Tyagaraja’s credit that Giriraja Kavi’s musical work, created during an era that was dominated by the trinity of Carnatic music, has secured him a lasting place of honour among the greats of Carnatic music.

“Innovation of Iron Technology and its Impact on Indian Society”: Two day UGC Seminar held at Kuppam University on February 25th and 26th 2019 [2]

“Innovation of Iron Technology and its Impact on Indian Society”: Two day UGC Seminar held at Kuppam University on February 25^th and 26^th 2019 [2]

Ayub Ali chaired the session, where Dolly Thomas, J. Soundararajan, Osman Pasha, Sivaramakrishnaiah and Jammana presented papers.

25-02-2019 proceedings continued: After lunch, some papers were read, presented by the scholars and researchers. There was paper, “Porto novo iron works – retelling the story of a failed industrial enterprise of 19^th century Madras and its impact,”  supposedly presented jointly G. J. Sudhakar and Dolly Thomas, however, it was presented by the latter. I pointed out that the places chosen by the Dutch and the British had already been the iron and steel products producing sites by the Indians. In other words, they had taken over with their power. The fail could be attributed to the financial adjustments, as the British officers were engaged in the “private business.” In a recent paper also, details are given about the successful run of the factory and then changing name[1]. It is stated clearly[2], “………….the Porto Novo factory serviced the needs of India and Britain for iron and steel for more than 25 years, although after 1849, it changed names.”

Mohammed Osman Pasha and Syed Ayub Ali presented a paper, “Social customs and rituals of iron making people in Telanga,” but, it was changed to other title. How and why Golconda rulers having land locked area should engage in exporting goods through the Coromandel coast ports was an intriguing factor. For example, Machilipatnam port was situated 350 kms from the Golconda capital. For this, the paper presenter tried to give different answers to justify. The “Banjaras” were engaged in transporting the goods.

1. Soundararajan presented, “Iron age in Krishnagiri region,” based on the field work carried on by him
2. Sivaramakrishnaiah, journalist presented a paper on the recent finding of iron implements in Telangana.

Jammanna presented a paper on the leather industry of the Madhiga people. Many pointed out that he should relate his paper to the theme of the seminar.

25-02-2019 – first session – Ayub Ali heads. Jammanna presented paper

25-02-2019 – first session – Ayub Ali heads.audience

The paper of E. Ravi and N. R. Charles had been, “Usage of iron in rituals and religious structures,” however, the paper presenter Charles delved upon the metallic items – chalice, paten, ablution cup, pyx, sprinkler, thurible, cross, paschal candle stick, ciborum, baptism bowl, censer, ambry, bell and others – used in church, that too, Roman Catholic,  without giving any date etc.

Balachandran presented a paper, “Innovation of iron technology & its impact on Indian society treatment of iron in Indian English poetry, ” without having any bearing on the subject matter. As an English professor, ironically, he tried to exploit through his speech and act.

26-02-2019 – K. V. Ramakrishna Rao chaired the session. Shyamala presented paper.

26-02-2019 – KVR session.audience

The second day proceedings: 26-02-2019 – first technical session – morning: This session was chaired by me and there were papers as follows:

First, I presented my paper, “The antiquity of iron and steel technology in India: Problem, probe and product,” with PPT. In between, Jitendra and Jaikishan were asking querries and I responded and proceeded. Aravinda Kumar and Harsha Vardhan also commented, but I responded and continued.

The iron implements found at Munigak, Morasi Ghundai, Asa shrine are dated to c.2250-1950 BCE period.

Ian De Lisle[3] and her colleagues note that, “As early as 6000 BC, southern India has been creating wootz (crucible) steel.

Ann Feuerbach[4], noted that, “Artifacts of crucibles and weapons have been found in the Indian area that date back to 3000-4000 BCE”

Rakesh Tewari [5] gives dates based on B. Sekar in the range of 1687-290 BCE for earlier Indian sites and 1882-486 BCE for Gangetic plains[6]. The results indicate that iron using and iron working was prevalent in the Central Ganga Plain and the Eastern Vindhyas from the early second millennium BCE.

IVC – Mundigak iron impements – Kenoyer

IVC – SAid Qala Tepe- iron implements – Kenoyer

IVC – SAid Qala Tepe- iron implements – Kenoyer

IVC – Ahar- iron impements – Kenoyer

Based on these specific excavated examples and datings, I suggested that the date of iron and steel and related historiography has to be correlated, corroborated and corresponded and revised accordingly.

1. Syamala with her paper “Delving into the history of iron technology in India: A historiographical study” argued that based on the archaeological evidences, history has to be written taking them into account.
2. Jayaram Natru, “Use of iron tools in domestic field in Kaviti mandal, Srikakulam District,” was just displaying current iron implements used. He accepted that he was presenting the paper for the first time.
3. Adinarayana “Iron age cultures in Andhra Pradesh: A review” Venkata Subbaia asked him that he was using his title and paper. Moreover, he could not answer the questions he asked about the sites. As the PhD scholar belongs to the same University, he could have acknowledged the papers of predecessors in his paper.
4. B. Lateeb Kumar “Iron and agriculture: A study on the impact of iron implements in the development of archaeology in Kerala.” First he claimed that from the very beginning of the common era itself, when Kerala was part of ancient Tamilakam, the people of Kerala used iron implements. However, he claimed that iron implements were not used for agriculture. “Brahminical settlements were growing in Kerala during 7^th century AD and as a result of this large areas of land were used for agricultural purpose….iron implements used………plough was introduced in south India through the Buddhist contacts…..” Thus, his views had been queer and evidently based on other interpretations, instead of archaeological evidences.
5. Bollepelly Manichanda, Aruri Devaraju and Jeshrun Shalem “Study of the utilization of Iron and steel in war fields.” Actually, the paper presenters were not available and the youngsters wanted them to be presented through their friend. Just to encourage the youngsters, it was allowed.

26-02-2019 -Jitendra chairing the second session – Ravichandra, A. Subash, John Milton, G.S.V. Prasad

26-02-2019 -Jitendra session.audience

The second technical session: The second session was chaired by Kurra Jitendra Babu. His title of the paper was “Description of metals in early and medieval Sanskrit texts,” however, he was talking about many issues. He was connected with naxalites, trustee of “Hampi mutt……,” mafia are after the land of the mutt and so on. He also passed remarks to the extent that, “I expected more important papers, but, the papers were not so good. Te papers presentedshould nt be published as such, as others would laugh at us. They have to be edited thoroughly before publishing.” He claimed that the Iranians invaded India and while returning, they erected two inscriptions at Afghanistan and Iran around 1380 BCE. When I asked give references about them, he could not give. He diverted by talking about other issues. When I asked to tell specifically, the two places, he was telling that he “would send me a book within  six months that contains all the details I want”!  Again when I asked, “was it the Bhogozkai inscription that mentions Indrasil, Mitrasil, Varunasil, Nasatya etc..,” he said “..no, they are different.” He was describing medieval chemical and siddhanta works. He was also referring a Telugu mass that describes different types of surgery and instruments. His remarks about the paper presented had been outrageous, as he cannot generalize all papers.

John Milton “Gender identities in megalithic cultures of iron age: A study of archaeological remains in Kothagudem Bhadradri district of Telngana.” He was trying to interpret that the “Mother worship” prevalent among the megalithic cultural people could have had an impact on them.

26-02-2019 -Jitendra session.audience.another view

26-02-2019 -Jitendra session.audience.another view.2

Subash “The Dutch East Indian company and the organization of iron trade in the 17^th century Golconda,” in fact, he was repeating about the Dutch trade again and again, instead of dealing with iron. He was repeating the point that nails were manufactured and they were used for building huge ships. Ayub Ali also pointing out that he was repeating, instead of giving specific examples about Iron. I also had drawn his attention to my published paper, “The Dutch Iron factory at Narsapur” in the last proceedings of the APHC[7].

Valedictory function: After one more technical session, the valedictory function was there. Prof Sarada Srinivasan, National Institute of Advanced Studies, IISc campus, Bangalore was the VIP. She spoke about the steel manufactured during the megalithic period in Tamilnadu and the process involved, that she called as “Tamil Nadu Process.” G. Narayanappa was the Special Invitee. After the function, the participants dispersed to their destination.

© K. V. Ramakrishna Rao

01-03-2019

[1] Anantanarayanan Raman, Large-scale iron and steel production in the Coromandel: the earliest and longest survived Porto Novo Iron Works (1830–1859), Current Science, VOL. 113, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2017, pp.984-989.

[2] https://www.currentscience.ac.in/Volumes/113/05/0984.pdf

[3] Ian De Lisle et al., Ancient Regional Steel quality: Historical method of steel production around the world, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, UK, 2016, p.1.

[4] Ibid, p.26.

 Feuerbach, Ann. Crucible Damascus Steel: A Fascination for Almost 2,000 Years, Jom 58.5 (2006): pp.48-50.

[5] Rakesh Tewari, The origins of iron-working in India: new evidence from the Central Ganga Plain and the Eastern Vindhyas, 2003, pp.536-545.

[6] These dates are calibrated by Dr B. Sekar, BSIP, Lucknow. References for data sets used: Stuiver, et al. 1998a. 537.

[7] K. V. Ramakrishna Rao, The Dutch Iron factory at Narsapur, the Proceedings of the APHC, Narsapur, 2018, pp.232-239.