THE GREATEST BATTLE OF CULTURE – A story of Harappans, penned by Fishers, Indiana-based Panigrahi Bethi and published through Notion press, is a fast-paced, interesting narrative which has been positioned as historical fiction, but in which one can find some truths germane to the commingling and evolution of diverse cultures and faiths in the Indian subcontinent. Although the author’s note identifies it as “a work of fiction, inspired by ancient history and genome study of the Indus Valley people that was published by various scientists”, some of the characters in the work do have striking parallels to storied and defied personalities in ancient India. As the title suggests, the major part of the narrative is about Harappans, whose initial conflicts and subsequent mingling with the Aryans over several generations, is believed to have contributed significantly to the evolution of Hinduism. The 145-page book comprises 25 chapters, starting with all-was-well-until-the-Aryans-arrived background and ending with the consensual spread of a broad-based faith encompassing Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism with its inclusive focus on love and compassion among followers sensing the need for unity and shared purpose.
Central to the theme of the work is how ‘Aryans’, portrayed as torchbearers of Vedic knowledge, gradually dislodged Harappans from their moorings. There is a delectable sprinkling of inter-cultural romance, palace intrigues, heroic resistance, quelled rebellion, sniper attacks, fusion of Harappan-Aryan arts, culture and urban planning, rise of the ugly
head of fundamentalism among disgruntled sections, Harappans’ shift to spiritual enlightenment, the ‘Aryan conquest’ mirrored by the expansionist Aryan-Harrappan alliance with the defining battle at the Kingdom of Kalinga, the enforcement of Varna system by Aryans that created a social hierarchy of Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas and Shudras – a concept that was entirely alien to the Harappans, the exodus of Harappans to their new homeland called Dravida so much so that they came to be known as Dravidians and the eventual decline of the Indus Valley civilisation amid prolonged drought, rise of Buddhism, the emergence of the Bhagavad Gita as a sacred text to counter Buddhism, and the fanning out of the Buddhist ambassadors post splintering of the Aryan kingdom due to internal dissensions.
Historically speaking, the Indus civilisation, earliest known urban culture of the Indian subcontinent, has been dated to about 2,500-1,700 BCE, though some of its southern sites may have lasted later into the 2nd millennium BCE. It is among the world’s three earliest civilisations, along with those of Mesopotamia and Egypt and, more importantly, the most extensive. The two major sites of the civilisation, Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, are in Pakistan’s, Punjab and Sindh provinces respectively. Apart from the two large cities, Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, the civilization comprised more than 100 towns and villages. Some scholars believe that Harappa succeeded Mohenjo-daro, which is known to have been devastated more than once by exceptional floods. Curiously, following recent changes brought by India’s National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), the Harappan society will henceforth be designated as ‘Sindhu-Saraswati civilisation’ in NCERT’s new Social Science textbooks, starting Class VI. That apart, the word ‘Aryan’ has widely differing connotations, depending on antiquity and as-yet unverified historical factors. Basically, Aryan was the name originally given to a people who were said to speak an archaic Indo-European language and who were thought to have settled in prehistoric times in ancient Iran and the northern Indian subcontinent. There is also the theory of an ‘Aryan race’ that appeared in the mid-19th century and remained prevalent until the mid-20th century. It has been postulated that perhaps light-skinned Aryans were the group who invaded and conquered ancient India from the north and whose literature, religion, and modes of social organisation subsequently shaped the course of Indian culture, particularly the Vedic religion that informed and was eventually superseded by Hinduism. Since the late 20th century, several scholars have rejected both the Aryan invasion hypothesis and the use of the term ‘Aryan’ as a racial designation, suggesting that the Sanskrit term arya (meaning ‘noble’ or ‘distinguished’) was a social rather than an ethnic epithet. On the whole, the book, as a work of fiction with relatable aspects of major faiths, stands out as a valuable addition to bookshelves.
