Indian Science Congress 2015: Goebbels Takes Birth in Science

(This article Written by Mrigank was published in New Democracy) 

Indian Science Congress started way back in 1914 to cultivate science in India as an annual event. Later  Congress started having a theme. This congress had been usually not very momentous event and of late it has tradition that it was inaugurated by Prime Minister. But this year it hit headlines and was in discussion even before it started. So much so that scientists in NASA has started a campaign  pleading Prime Minister of India to stop session on day one and control ‘uneducated’ ministers as it is insulting to the land of Bhaskara and Aryabhatta. It said "We as scientific community should be seriously concerned about the infiltration of pseudo-science in science curricula with backing of influential political parties. Giving a scientific platform for a pseudo-science talk is worse than a systematic attack that has been carried out by politically powerful pseudo-science propagandists in the recent past. If we scientists remain passive, we are betraying not only the science, but also our children." It was initiated by Dr. Ram Prasad Gandhi Raman, a scientist with the NASA’s Ames Research Centre in California and been signed by more than 200 scientists. Very appropriately, known Astrophysicist J V Narlikar said "But we shouldn't claim things of which there is no evidence or proof as it reduces the credibility of what our scientists have achieved in the past. Even the West recognizes the knowledge of mathematics held by Indians. If we start making outlandish claims, the scientific community of world will not look up to us as it does now,"

The session being talked about was called “Ancient Sciences through Sanskrit “. In this session papers were presented which tried to prove the point that most of science and technology that exists today already existed in ancient Sanskrit texts. It had papers on “Ancient Indian Aviation Technology” by Captain Bodas (Retired Principal, Pilot Training Centre) & Ameya Jadhav (Lecturer, Swami Vivekanand International School and Junior College), “Advances in surgery in ancient India” by Ashwin Sawant, “Scientific Principles of Ancient Indian Architecture and Civil Engineering” by Asawari Bapat (Visiting Faculty, Department of Sanskrit, University of Mumbai) “Scientific Principles of Ancient Indian Architecture and Civil Engineering” by Rahul V Altekar (Consultant) “Science and Spirituality” by Binny Sareen (Spiritual Counseling & PR & Media at Global Hospital). Apart from these there was a lecture by Prakash Javdekar.

The Congress was inaugurated by Prime Minister. Although this time he refrained from making kind of remarks he made while inaugurating a hospital in Mumbai, but his ministers filled the void. Chief Guest Prakash Javdekar as sophisticated as always remarked that "the scientific community gathered at the Congress should pay attention to the source material available in Sanskrit and use it for betterment of humanity,". And Hashvardhan claimed "Our scientists discovered the Pythagoras theorem, but we ... gave credit to the Greeks. We all know that we knew ‘beejganit’ much before the Arabs, but very selflessly we allowed it to be called Algebra. This is the base the Indian scientific community has maintained." & “Whether it is related to the solar system, medicine, chemistry or earth science, we have shared all our knowledge very selflessly,”.

Although there were variety of papers, paper on aviation technology has attracted most attention, as it contains tall claims and a semblance of authenticity. It claims that aircrafts were present in ancient India. Not just that, they were far superior to what we see today. They were much larger, could fly backwards & sideways and were even used for interplanetary movements by Rishis! The authors give many references to prove their point. Their claims are mainly based on a work by Rishi Bhardwaj called “Vaimānika Shāstra”. They went on claiming that this book describes metallurgy and called people to use this to make alloys to make aircrafts rather than importing it. According to him this book also describes the diet of aeronauts, making of cells (for power generation) etc. They claim that based on this, an aircraft built by one Shivkar Bapuji Talpade and he was the one who first flew a flying machine over Chowpatty in 1895, eight years before Wright brothers did so. They tried to make it look authentic by quoting extensively and citing references, but for one major reference[i]  which we shall discuss a little later. This ‘non citing’ could not have been an oversight. This was probably further development of Goebbels. That is not just lie spoken repeatedly but also presenting things in such a way (with references etc.) that it looks authentic.

Let us examine these facts. First, let us examine the word Vimana. Sanskrit word vi-māna literally means "measuring out, traversing" or "having been measured out"[ii]. One can see that this word only later came to be used for aircraft. Its reference in ancient texts must have been what it originally means. There are many such words. Say, for example aushadh meant plants in ancient Sanskrit and only later it became synonymous with medicine. Therefore, there is little to assume that initial reference to this word musty be its original meaning rather than the one attribute in course of evolution of language.

They also cite is verse in Rigveda and its interpretation by Swami Dayanaand Saraswati. Although, the existing Rigveda versions do not mention Vimanas, but verses RV 1.164.47-48 have been taken as evidence for the idea of "mechanical birds":

47. kṛṣṇáṃ niyânaṃ hárayaḥ suparṇâ / apó vásānā dívam út patanti
tá âvavṛtran sádanād ṛtásyâd / íd ghṛténa pṛthivî vy ùdyate

48. dvâdaśa pradháyaś cakrám ékaṃ / trîṇi nábhyāni ká u tác ciketa
tásmin sākáṃ triśatâ ná śaṅkávo / 'rpitâḥ ṣaṣṭír ná calācalâsaḥ

"Dark the descent: the birds are golden-coloured; up to the heaven they fly robed in the waters.
Again descend they from the seat of Order, and all the earth is moistened with their fatness."

"Twelve are the fellies, and the wheel is single; three are the naves. What man hath understood it?
Therein are set together spokes three hundred and sixty, which in nowise can be loosened."

Swami Dayananda Saraswati[iii] interpreted these verses to mean: "jumping into space speedily with a craft using fire and water ... containing twelve stamghas (pillars), one wheel, three machines, 300 pivots, and 60 instruments.". Although the 'wheel' is likeliest a metaphorical description of the yearly cycle [original research?], and '12' and the '360' are likeliest its months and days. Idea is simple. Quoting some vague portion of ancient text and then reinterpreting after trying to juxtapose it with what is known today. This way anything can be proved.

They also hid the fact that as far back as 1974, a group of inquisitive and zealot scientists from Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore have taken pains to scientifically study the claimi. These scientists have made a detailed study of the text of Vaimānika Shāstra. It was discovered that this text was written by one Subbarayya Shastry. They have taken pains to try to locate him, in the process have successfully met his adopted son Venkatrama Sastry and GV Sharma his close associate. Pandit Subbaraya Shastry was not a scholar and apparently verses just used to occur to him (much the same way as it occurred to prophet) and he used to narrate to GV who have copied them. This means that he did not have any text written by Bharadwaj and he was not recounting. Probably as and when he could formulate one sloka, he narrated and GV Sharma copied the same. These were kept in Baroda University Library. In 1951, Josyer held inauguration of International Academy of Sanskrit Research.  He displayed rare manuscripts including Vaimānika Shāstra. This is its first popular display.

They have analyzed the language of these texts. They found that shlokas are as per “anushtup अनुष्टुप” meter of verses. Their language is modern. Secondly, in most of the post Vedic texts of Sanskrit, there is no mention of any aircraft. Even Mahabharata or Ramayana have not mentioned any general usage of aircrafts. Only reference is to Pushpaka and it is powered by mantras or such powers. There is absolutely no detailed description anywhere. From these studies they concluded that this text is written sometime between 1900 and 1922 by Pandit Subbaraya Shastry, and not by Rishi Bharadwaj in 5000BC.

There is no description of basic principles and theory of the aircrafts in this book. Author straight away describes the aircraft. Although description is detailed, and talks about pilot, air routes, metals and many yantras, the principles of using them is missing. They tell planes like “mantrik”, “tantric” and “kritak”. In last categories, four planes are described viz. Shakuna, Sundara, Rukma and Tripura. These scientist have studied the design. There are certain drawings and many of them have parts which only became known in 18^th century. They tried to describe the principles of functionality of tail and hinged wings, which are not scientifically correct, nor does the geometry looks feasible for flying. There are inconsistencies in the dimensions given in drawing and verses. Shakuna is bird aircraft and author does not have any idea of how things heavier than air can float. Sundar has gas engines. There is vague description of electricity generation by combination of friction, solar rays, heat etc. through the use of ‘jyotirmukha’ and certain other materials including donkey’s urine. It sucks air from bottom and exhaust them from top. This is just the opposite of what mechanics teaches us. It contradicts third law of motion. There are similar unscientific description of fuels and operation of the plane. And speed is some 8000 miles per hour, which has not yet been achieved by any aircraft so far! Rukma has similar flaws. While the first three were meant to be flown in air, Tripara was meant to traverse in air, water and ground. There is also a mention of using anti-gravity and mental powers! Again, any details are missing.

All these planes are just poor concoctions far away from reality. There is no concept of propulsion mechanism and floating in the air leave apart traversing at high speed. Author had no idea of aeronautics, dynamics and had just copied some modern ideas and pictures to make it look authentic. Their geometries are horrendous for flying, and the principles of propulsion described are such they will just do the opposite. Text has no relation with drawings and probably were drawn later. It was concluded that the described machines are not practically feasible and cannot fly at all. The description is incomplete, logically inconsistent and has little to do with scientific principles.

And they claimed Talpade flew an aircraft based on these. There is no record of the adventure of Mr. Talpade. They blame British rule for destroying the evidences. This aircraft had an engine supposedly driven by mercury power. There is however only a vague description of making of such engines. How did Mr. Talpade made this based on those texts remains an unanswered question. But cleverly these people leave out the fact that in his autobiography, Sastry himself admits that these verses may not have practical use and Dr. Talpade tried to make many models under the guidance of Sastry but did not succeed.[iv] Goebbels has taken a full incarnation.

Similarly, there was claim by Harshvardhan that we have generously given Pythagoras theorem to western world. There were papers which claimed how complicated surgeries were performed, how autopsies were done, even describes making of electric batteries. That there were talks of many advancements in mathematics and so on. A paper on ‘Engineering applications of ancient Indian botany’ talked about how herbal paste made of seeds and roots mixed with cow’s urine when applied to a person’s feet could locate underground water sources. Also, cow dung, jaggery, coconut water, egg whites and green algae were used as natural polymers. The Sushruta Samhita was the basis for a paper on “advances in surgery in ancient India”, which described surgical instruments and claimed plastic and reconstruction surgeries were performed more than 3500 years ago. “We are asking for due credit to be given to Shushruta to be known worldwide as the father of surgeons,” said professor Ashok Nene. While it is true that Shushruta has described some surgical procedures, but they were primitive.

All these papers and statements have some basic commonalities. One, they all assume that there were big advancements in science and technology in ancient India and all that is described in scriptures as old as 5000 BC.

They all presume that any description in ancient text is correct, even if it is neither accurate nor complete. Most of the things cited by these Vedic scientists are merely extrapolations of unclear ambiguities to what we know today. That is why they could never tell anything in advance. They could only reinterpret when something was known. They claim many treatments of diseases we know today. But prior to disease being identified by modern science, they never ever even mentioned them. Same is true for any invention. If these things were already known, why they were discovered (invented is more apt) only after modern science describes them? Why did they not describe things as they are rather than making vague narratives? If knowledge is contained in these scriptures then there is no reason not to have already found them? The knowledge and science is not static. It evolves and develops. But in these instances, we find that instead of developing it vanishes. An Indian scientist from the US who attended the session told Times Of India, "Knowledge always grows, its flow never stops. So if all this knowledge was available in the ancient days, I need to know where it stopped. Why did it fail to grow? Why was there no advancement? When did it stop?..."

They have declared that Vedas are source of any and every knowledge. If this were true, why they have not told us everything that we are going to know? Why just don’t read Vedas and churn out everything from these books? Is there any description of evolution in Vedas? What about dinosaurs? Prebiotic and later evolution, beginning of universe, role of DNA and proteins …… List can fill volumes.

They quite ignore the fact that many things are fantasies. In fact in this regard, all are fantasies, some of ancient people and rest of these ‘modern’ people. Man had been fantasizing about many things all over the world and still does. This does not mean that all the fantasies are real. Fantasies have limits. It has to have a basis of current knowledge. That is why initial text only mention about flying chariots (along with horses) and only later they were made to be flying machines. There are such concepts all over the world. That is why Mahabharata fantasizes about many devastating weapons, but all as some modifications of existing and then conceivable bows, arrows clubs and the like. There is absolutely no reason to refer to a nuclear missile as arrow.

There is development of language. Sanskrit too has developed. The Sanskrit of Rig Veda is very ancient and many words used in this have changed their meaning later and many words are still a matter of interpretation. This fact is grossly misused by the presenters. Many Sanskrit and Vedic scholars have criticized the claim saying that it is deliberate misinterpretation.

Secondly, any similarity is purposefully and sort of forcibly extrapolated and interpreted. Say for example, knowledgeable Home Minister Raj Nath Singh claimed that uncertainty principle was there in Vedas as it describes some uncertainty somewhere. This proves that our great Rishis were versed with Quantum Mechanics. He either forgets the fact or is ignorant that Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is valid only for canonical variables and so far only two such pairs have been found.  It is not a general statement on measuring things with certainty. Maharishi Kanada had an idea of Atom but not beyond this. And that idea too was not very accurate and exhaustive. He mentioned that all things are made up of small particles called Anu but did not have any idea about its structure or there are different atoms and elements. How five basic elements described in Vedas fit in this too was not very clear. Many starts jumping to conclusion that atma and sthool sharIr is exactly same as matter- energy dualism. Obviously without even understanding the meaning of it. Much acclaimed so called Vedic Mathematics is nothing but a collection of tricks and mnemonics.

We have found remains of ancient civilizations. There are material evidences of the world prior to advent of modern man. But no one has found remains of these great inventions and discoveries. Where did they vanish? Why this knowledge was not perpetuated? These remain unanswered questions.

There were advances in mathematical science and astronomy in India. We had Aryabhatta, Bhaskara, Sridhara, Madhava etc. They have made many advancements and observations. They have fair idea of mathematics of variation (calculus), quadratic equations, trigonometry, many aspects algebra, number theory etc. This is a fact that while writing history of science, many if these were ignored by western history writers. But that does not mean we can invent history in overreaction. In this regard too, there are many points to be seen. One, these were not as ancient as Vedas. Second, while there were many observations, there were not much theoretical backing. Say for instance, J V Narlikar said 'Vedang Jyotish' had a mention of theorem similar to Pythagoras one but there was no supporting evidence or how it was developed. That is the proof was missing, only observation was found. He further comments “… Similarly saying that 'Brahmastra' mentioned in Mahabharata was a nuclear device or mention of Pushpak Viman in Ramayana was proof of aviation in ancient times was baseless. "Indian scientists did know of 'atom' or 'anu' then but not beyond it. A nuclear weapon at that time is out of question. Knowledge of nuclear science requires prior knowledge of electromagnetism and there is no evidence that it existed …". The point is certain (only certain) observations and formulations were there, but they were not well developed and scientifically deduced. Thirdly, this knowledge was not used for any applied or theoretical advancement and remained in ‘closed chest’. 

Linking this with national pride is another dangerous thing they are indulged in. there are attempts to show that believing in these claims is directly related to nationalism. They makes us believe that hyping the glory of past to prove one’s greatness is an expression of pride. This on one hand can be an overreaction of not giving credit to where Indians deserved, but on the other hand is an expression of inferiority complex. That is one lagging behind (for historical reasons), so to cover it up and prove that we alone can be great, get into such pseudo-patriotism. Even this government has cut funds in higher education (IITs worst hit), and has no policy to develop indigenous science and technology development, has to promote such measures to mask its actual face. National pride would be if we actually develop something new, ponder why after CV Raman, we have few  great scientist who has worked in India for their noticeable research, why our trained scientists have to seek greener pastures abroad, why we failed to judge likes of Har Gobind Khurana and give them respectable placement in India, why our labs have become outpost of foreign labs and our scientists underpaid post-doctoral fellow for them, why are we struggling to have quick and reasonable diagnostic tool, preventive measures  and treatment for diseases like Malaria, tuberculosis, typhoid, etc., why we have to import pettiest technology from abroad, and even if there is an alternate and good research in India, we fail to encourage the same……

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[i] Mukunda, H.S.; Deshpande, S.M., Nagendra, H.R., Prabhu, A. and Govindraju, S.P. (1974). "A critical study of the work "Vyamanika Shastra"". Scientific Opinion: 5–12.

[ii] Monier-Williams, Sanskrit-English Dictionary, version 0.1a_12

[iii] Dayananda Saraswati, “Rig‐veda Bhashya Bhumika”, Vydika Yantralaya, Ajmer, 1929

[iv] G. Venkatachala Sharma, The Autobiography (in English of Pandit  Subbaraya Shastry), published by M. C. Krishnaswamy Iyengar, and C. Venkatachala Sharma