HISTORY TIME: Das with his work

If our neglected monuments and empty museums are anything to go by, it would seem Indians take their history lightly. Yet, recent archaeological findings have evoked interest, challenging accepted notions about our past. The excavations at Dholavira, for example, deepened our understanding of the Indus Valley Civilisation.

Today, should another dramatic archaeological discovery turn out to be all it promises, it would push back the history of urban settlement in India-and maybe the world-by at least 2,000 years. These findings, off the coast of Gujarat, are the hottest topic of debate among scholars today.

The submerged site in the Gulf of Cambay could turn out to be the earliest known settlement in India, changing the starting point from where we track the history of our civilisation. These excavations could not only be as dramatic as finding Mohenjodaro, they could date it back to 7500 b.c. Archaeologists hope the discovery will reveal the missing link connecting two lots of our ancestors, the hunter and the farmer.

Our cover story this week takes a much-needed breather from the debris of politics and the wreck of global geopolitics. From Delhi, Executive Editor Raj Chengappa spoke to scholars about the consequences of such a major shift in the boundaries of history. Chief Illustrator Nilanjan Das painstakingly recreated the sites through graphics from the blurred sonar images. In Chennai, Principal Correspondent Arun Ram met the oceanographers who found this world under water.

The rigours of scholarship demand more work from both groups: the oceanographers must map the site as close to its entirety as possible, archaeology experts must then study the artifacts brought to the surface and find a watertight method to accurately date them before presenting their findings in academic journals. Says Chengappa: "This discovery could revolutionise the way we look at our history." We may yet have to rewrite chapters of our textbooks in a fundamental rather than fundamentalist way.

(Aroon Purie)