N. S. Rajaram

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Navaratna Srinivasa Rajaram (born 1943 in Mysore, India) is an author notable for his extensive publications on the archeology and ancient history of India, focusing on the "Indigenous Aryans" controversy in Indian politics, in some instances in co-authorship with David Frawley.

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[edit] Professional career

Rajaram holds a Ph.D. degree in mathematics from Indiana University, and has published papers on statistics in the 1970s [4][5] and on artificial intelligence [6][7] and robotics[8] in the 1980s.

[edit] Indian history

Rajaram has published on topics related to ancient Indian history and Indian archeology, alleging Eurocentric bias in mainstream Indology and Sanskrit scholarship, arguing within the "Indigenous Aryans" ideology instead. According to Rajaram,

"Indology is a ‘secular eschatology’ built around a Euro-centric view of the world... Its creators were driven mainly by European colonial and Christian missionary interests."[citation needed]

Rajaram's work and publications claim to expose the lack of scientific methodology that has gone into the field of Indology. He has criticized the process by which, he says, eurocentric 19th century Indologists / missionaries arrived at many of their conclusions. Rajaram questions how it was possible for 19th century European evangelical Indologists / missionaries to study and develop hypotheses on Indian history, claiming many of them were functionally illiterate in Indian languages, including even the fundamental classical language, Sanskrit, suggesting that "every available modern tool from archaeology to computer science" be used to "clearing away the cobwebs cast by questionable linguistic theories" as he chooses to refer to mainstream historical linguistics and philology.[1]

Rajaram has also published on historical Indian mathematics found in the Sulbasutras and the Vedas.

[edit] Criticism

Rajaram's and Jha's claim of having deciphered the Indus script was universally rejected. Regarding the "Indus horse" hoax, Asko Parpola, professor of Indology at Helsinki University, stated that[2]

“ It is sad that India's heritage should be exploited by some individuals — usually people with little or no academic credentials — who for political or personal motives are ready even to falsify evidence. In order to vindicate their ideology and promote their own ends, these persons appeal to the feelings of the 'common man' who, with full reason, is proud of his or her country's grand heritage. Thus far Rajaram has got away with this dishonesty because the scholarly community has not considered this work worthy of consideration: it has been taken more or less for granted that any sensible person can see through this trash and recognize it as such. However, the escalation of this nonsensical propaganda now demands the issue to be addressed. ”

Former Director General of the Geological Survey of India, Subimal Sinharoy notes however:

“ Michael Witzel and Steve Farmer seem to have lost the perspective when they say that "the sign is totally abstract and does not contain a hint of any animistic form" in regard to N.S. Rajaram's second horse.[3] ”

Indus script expert Iravatham Mahadevan likewise dismisses Jha-Rajaram 'decipherment' as a "non-starter" and "completely invalid"[4], and on Rajaram's contributions to the opus specifically judges that

""Rajaram's outbursts speak for themselves and need no annotation. The first part of the book is not about academic research on the technical problem of deciphering an unknown script. It is crude communal propaganda with obvious political overtones, betraying deep mistrust of foreigners and alien ideologies and intolerance towards religious and linguistic minorities."[5]

His contributions characterized by physicist and pseudoscience expert Alan Sokal as pseudoscience[6].

[edit] Works

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Rajaram 1995, page 230, (cited in Bryant 2001 page 74
  2. ^ A. Parpola, Of Rajaram's 'Horses', 'decipherment' and civilisational issues, Frontline, November 2000 [1].
  3. ^ Thoughts on Tibet Frontline - Dec. 9 - 22, 2000
  4. ^ I. Mahadevan, One sees what one wants to, Frontline, November 2000 [2].
  5. ^ Mahadevan, Iravatham, Aryan or Dravidian or Neither? A Study of Recent Attempts to Decipher the Indus Script (1995-2000) EJVS (ISSN 1084-7561) vol. 8 (2002) issue 1 (March 8).[3]
  6. ^ Rajaram's claim that Many of the questions arising in Quantum Physics today had been anticipated by Swami Vivekananda heads the chapter on Hindu nationalism in Alan Sokal's 2004 essay on Pseudoscience and Postmodernism

[edit] References

  • Alan D. Sokal, Pseudoscience and Postmodernism: Antagonists or Fellow-Travelers? in: Archaeological Fantasies: How Pseudoarchaeology Misrepresents the Past and Misleads the Public, ed. Fagan (2004).
  • "Horseplay in Harappa" review by Witzel & Farmer, Frontline, October 2000.
  • A Tale of Two Horses, Frontline, November 2000, includes:
    • N. S. Rajaram, "Frontline Cover has 'the head of a horse'" [9]
    • "Jha sent the photo... I have not computer enhanced it" (interview with Rajaram)
    • A. Parpola, Of Rajaram's 'Horses', 'decipherment' and civilisational issues
    • I. Mahadevan One sees what one wants to [10]
    • Witzel & Farmer, New Evidence on the 'Piltdown Horse' Hoax

[edit] See also

[edit] External links