Date of Mahabharata War and other Research Articles

By London Swaminathan

Date of Mahabharata war has been a debatable issue for very long. Still, we don’t find a unanimous opinion. Traditional belief is that it happened around 3130 BCE, just before the start of Kaliyuga. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any archaeological proof to support it. Even though marine archaeological discoveries in and around Dwaraka point towards that direction, we need more supporting evidence. But it was true that a war happened long ago. I have summarised the opinion of three sets of scholars.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pustaka Digital Media
• Release date: Oct 15, 2022
• ISBN: 6580553509136

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Date of Mahabharata War and other Research Articles

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London Swaminathan

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Contents

Foreword

1. Date of Mahabharata War

2. Mahabharata at One Go! Bullet Point Summary of 18 Chapters!

3. Lions and Elephants in Mahabharata!

4. Yaksha Prasna: Parts 1, 2, 3

5. HINDUS SOLVE SOUTH AMERICA’S GREATEST MYSTERY- NAZCA LINES- Part 1

6. HINDUS SOLVE SOUTH AMERICA’S GREATEST MYSTERY-2

7. PANDU - TIGER AMONG MEN!

8. You can tell Lies in Five Places: Mahabharata

9. When can you tell a lie? Adi Shankara’s Advice

10. Adi Shankara on Wives and Friends !

11. Sin Committed in Secrecy: Adi Shankara

12. The More you Bow, The More you Grow: Adi Shankara

13. Adi Shankara & Mysterious Sundara Pandya!

14. Spontaneous Combustion Miracle in Mahavamsa!

15. ‘Kaa te Kaantaa ? Kaste Putraha?’ Who is Wife? Who is Son?

16. Snakes and Snake Bites in Mahabharata!

17. Mahabharata Pandu in Britain too!

18. Questions from London Medical Students!- Part 1

19. Hindu Issues: Questions from Medical Students!- Part 2

Foreword

Date of Mahabharata war has been a debatable issue for very long. Still, we don’t find a unanimous opinion. Traditional belief is that it happened around 3130 BCE, just before the start of Kaliyuga. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any archaeological proof to support it. Even though marine archaeological discoveries in and around Dwaraka point towards that direction, we need more supporting evidence. But it was true that a war happened long ago. I have summarised the opinion of three sets of scholars.

Other interesting matters in this book include the Yakssha Prasna, animals in Mahabaharata and new interpretation of Nazca lines of South America. Ten medical mysteries, Cloning, women of Mahabharata, different opinion about the beginning of Kaliyuga and Inter Galactic Travel of Arjuna are published in my previous books. Bhagavad Gita, Vishnu Sahasranama, Vidura Niti, Stories of Nala Damayanti, Savitri are all part of Mahabharata and they are not included here. I have written about them whic will come in book form soon.

In addition to Mahabharata, we discuss here Adi Shankara’s works. The last two articles are about the questions raised by medical students of London. There is more material such as proverbs, similes and geography and history found in Mahabharata. I will publish my articles on those topics soon.

Since these articles are written and posted over ten years in my blogs, some repetitions are unavoidable. Please bear with them. I am looking forward to your comments on the articles.

London Swaminathan

September 2022

1. Date of Mahabharata War

Research article No.1383; Dated 1st November 2014.

Mahabaharata stands out in the epic literature of the world for various reasons:

1.This is the longest epic in the world with one hundred thousand couplets.

2.It is said that all the subjects under the sun are dealt with by the author Vyasa and the saying goes Vyasochchishtam Jagath sarvam i.e. The whole world is the spit of Vyasa. That is nothing is untouched by Vyasa. In the epic itself it is said that what you find elsewhere in the world is already here.

3.The date of the great war is debatable because there is no archaeological proof to confirm the traditional date.

Hindus strongly believed in the traditional date of the war around 3100 BCE. But scholars who believed in archaeology of Gangetic plains think that it was fought around 1500 BCE. Either way it is interesting.

Two inscriptions give the date of Kali Yuga. Both of them believed that Kaliyuga commenced around 3100 BCE!

a)Aihole Inscription of Chalukya King Pulekesi II stated that the inscription was made in the year 3735 of Kali era when the Saka era was 556. This meant that the Kali era began in 3101 BCE.

b)Parthivasekarapuram copper plate Tamil inscription of Ko Karunathadakkan gave the number of days of Kali passed as 1449087! The inscription is dated around 865CE.

This shows that Hindus believed in the date of 3100 BCE as Kaliyuga year 1. Till this date all South Indian Panchangs (traditional ephemeris) give the date of Saka, Vikrama and Kali era faithfully. Hindus believe that the war happened just before the Kali Yuga began.

Now I will summarise the views of some scholars who attended seminars on Mahabharata or contributed articles on this subject:

16th century Abul fazal’s ‘Ain-i-Akbari’ – the 40th year of din-I Llahi 4696 years have elapsed from the beginning of Kali Yuga. This means war took place in 3137 BCE

12th century Kalhana’s Rajatarangini – Kali 653 i.e 2500 BCE. So the war took place before 2500 BCE.

Kalhana was the first historian according towstern scholars. That Kashmiri Brahmin was the first one to write Indian History with dates. But he did a blunder in calculating the Kali Yuga. Still scholars wonder how he committed this mistake. There are various theories about it.

R.Morton Smith – 1050 BCE

Srinivas Raghavan 3067 BCE

P C Sen Guptas 2449 BCE

Dr Sankalia – later than 15th century BCE

S B Roy on the basis of astronomical calculations – 1424 BCE

S B ROY in his book Date of Mahabharata Battle has beautifully summarised the views of scholars in this field as follows:–

Group A who believed in the date 3100 BCE

D R Mankad- 3201 BCE

M M Krishnamachari – 3137 BCE

C V Vaidya – 3102 BCE

V B Athvale – 3016 BCE

Group B (2500 BCE)

Varahamihira (Brihat Samhita)

Kalhana (Rajatarangini)

P C Sengupta (Indian Chronology)

Group C (1450 BCE)

A.Cunningham – 1424 BCE

K P Jaiswal – 1424 BCE

Tarakeshwar Bhattacharya – 1432 BCE

Giridra Sekhar Basu – 1416 BCE

Bankim Chandra Chatterji – 1400 BCE

Swami Vivekananda – 1400 BCE

(Complete Works, Vol.II, PP 27,29

A D Pusalkar 1400 BCE

Bala Gangadhara Tilak – 1400 BCE (in his book Gita Rahasya)

H C Deb – 1400 BCE

B B Ketkar – 1267 BCE

Shri Aurobindo -1191 BCE

(in his book Vyasa and Valmiki)

K L Dapthari 1197 BCE

K G Shankar – 1197 BCE

Sitanath Pradhan – 1151 BCE

Group D (950 BCE)

Pargiter – 950 BCE

Roy Chowdhuri – 900 BCE

My comments: Tamil inscription and Pulikesin’s Aihole inscription confirm the traditional date for Kaliyuga i.e.3100 BCE. Our Panchangam also sticks to the traditional date. They were not influenced by the concocted and outmoded theory of Aryan Invasion. They were of pure and unpolluted mind. Moreover Megasthenes of third century BCE said that 143 generations had passed before his time. His statement is repeated by other Greek authors. Even if we give 20 years per king then it would add up 2860. This gives the traditional date 2860+Appr.300 BCE). Inscriptions never lie. Kalhana and Varahamihira lost 600 years in their calculations because of some vague astronomical positions.

It is very interesting to note that scholars differ widely even after several seminars. We must hold one more seminar or conference in the light of new evidence from the submarine Dwaraka, underground Sarasvati River and the revised date of Rig Veda from Shriknat Talegari and American Sanskrit scholars.

The following three books give lot of information on this topic:

Mahabharata Myth and Reality – Differing Views, Agam Prakashan, New Delhi

Age of Bharata War, Edited by G C Agarwala, Motilal Banarsidas, 1979

Date of Mahabharata battle, S B Roy, The Academic Press, Gurgaon, 197

Long live the Greatest, Oldest and Longest Epic Mahabharata!!

POSTED ON 1 NOVEMBER 2014

2. Mahabharata at One Go! Bullet Point Summary of 18 Chapters!

Date: 26 March 2017; Post No. 3758

Most of us including me, find it difficult to read all the 100,000 couplets, 200,000 lines, one million words in the world’s longest epic, Mahabharata. They say about this epic,

"What is found in this epic may be elsewhere;

What is not in this epic is nowhere else".

It is an ever inspiring, never tiring and most interesting