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On Yuan Chwang's travels in India, 629-645 A.D.
By Thomas Watters
Edited after his death by T. W. Rhys Davids and S. W. Bushell
Published by Royal Asiatic Society, London - 1904

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In the year 629, the year after the arrival of Muhammad's envoys at Canton and thirty odd years after the landing of Pope Gregory's missionaries in England, a certain learned and devout Buddhist named Yuan Chwang stated out from Sian-fu (Singan), Tai-tsung's capital, upon a great journey to India. He was away sixteen years, he returned in 645, and he wrote an account of his travels which is treasured as a Chinese classic. One or two points about his experiences are to be noted here because they contribute to our general review of the state of the world in the seventh century A. D.

Yuan Chwang was as eager for marvels and as credulous as Herodotus, and without the latter writer's fine sense of history, he could never pass a monument or ruin without learning some fabulous story about it (Chinese ideas of the dignity of literature perhaps prevented him from telling us much detail of how he travelled, who were his attendants) how he was lodged, or what he ate and how he paid his expenses details precious to the historian; nevertheless, he gives us a series of illuminating flashes upon China, Central Asia, and India in the period now under consideration.

His journey was an enormous one. He went and came back by way of the Pamirs. He went by the northern route, crossing the desert of Gobi, passing along the southern slopes of the Thien Shan, skirting the great deep blue lake of Issik Kul, and so to Tashkend and Samarkand, and than mere or less in the footsteps of Alexander the Great southward to the Khyber Pass and Peshawur. He returned by the south-ern route, crossing the Pamirs from Afghanistan to Kashgar, and so along the line of retreat the Yue-Chi had followed in the reverse direction seven centuries before, and by Yarkand, along the slopes of the Kuen Lun to rejoin his former route near the desert end of the Great Wall. Each route involved some hard mountaineering. His journeyings in India are untraceable; he was there fourteen years, and he went all over the peninsula from Nepal to Ceylon.

At that time there was an imperial edict forbidding foreign travel, so that Yuan Chwang started from Sian-fu like an escaping criminal. There was a pursuit to prevent him carrying out his project. How he bought a lean red-coloured horse that knew the desert paths from a strange grey-beard, how he dodged a frontier guard-house with the help of a "foreign person" who made him a bridge of brushwood lower down the river, how he crossed the desert guided by the bones of men and cattle, how he saw a mirage, and how twice he narrowly escaped being shot by arrows when he was getting water near the watch-towers on the desert track, the reader will find in the Life. He lost his way in the desert of Gobi, and for four nights and five days he had no water; when he was in the mountains among the glaciers, twelve of his party were frozen to death. All this is in the Life; he tells little of it in his own account of his travels.

He shows us the Turks, this new development of the Hun tradition, in possession not only of what is now Turkestan, but all along the northern route. He mentions many cities and considerable cultivation. He is entertained by various rulers, allies of, or more or less nominally tributaries to, China, and among others by the Khan of the Turks, a magnificent person in green satin, with his long hair tied with silk.

"The gold embroidery of this grand tent shone with a dazzling splendour; the ministers of the presence in attendance sat on mats in long rows on either side all dressed in magnificent brocade robes, while the rest of the retinue on duty stood behind. You saw that although it was a case of a frontier ruler, yet there was an air of distinction and elegance. The Khan came out from his tent about thirty paces to meet Yuan Chwang, who, after a courteous greeting, entered the tent. After a short interval envoys from China and Kao-chang were admitted and presented their despatches and credentials, which the Khan perused. He was much elated, and caused the envoys to be seated, then he ordered wine and music for himself and them and grape-syrup for the pilgrim. Hereupon all pledged each other, and the filling and draining of the wine cups made a din and bustle, while the mingled music of various instruments rose loud: although the airs were the popular strains of foreigners, yet they pleased the sense and exhilarated the mental faculties. After a little, piles of roasted beef and mutton were served for the others, and lawful food, such as cakes, milk, candy, honey, and grapes, for the pilgrim. After the entertainment, grape-syrup was again served, and the Khan invited Yuan Chwang to improve the occasion, whereupon the pilgrim expounded the doctrines of the 'ten virtues,' compassion for animal life, and the paramitas and emancipation. The Khan, raising his hands, bowed, and gladly believed and accepted the teaching."

Yuan Chwang's account of Samarkand is of a large and prosperous city, "a great commercial entrep�t, the country about it very fertile, abounding in trees and flowers and yielding many fine horses. Its inhabitants were skilful craftsmen, smart and energetic." At that time we must remember there was hardly such a thing as a town in Anglo-Saxon England.

As his narrative approached his experiences in India, however, the pious and learned pilgrim in Yuan Chwang got the better of the traveller, and the book becomes congested with monstrous stories of incredible miracles. Nevertheless, we get an impression of houses, clothing, and the like, closely resembling those of the India of to-day. Then, as now, the kaleidoscopic variety of an Indian crowd contrasted with the blue uniformity of the multitude in China. In the time of Buddha it is doubtful if there were reading and writing in India ; now reading and writing were quite common accomplishments. Yuan Chwang gives an interesting account of a great Buddhist university at Nalanda, where ruins have quite recently been discovered and excavated. Nalanda and Taxilla seem to have been considerable educational centres as early as the opening of the schools of Athens. The caste system Yuan Chwang found fully established in spite of Buddha, and the Brahmins were now altogether in the ascendant. He names the four main castes we have mentioned in Chap. 'viii, � 6 (q. v.), but his account of their functions is rather different, The Sudras, he says, were the tillers of the soil. Indian writers say that their inflation was to wait upon the three "twice born" castes above them.

But, as we have already intimated, Yuan Chwang's account of Indian realities is swamped by his, accumulation of legends and pious inventions. For these he had come, and in these he rejoiced. The rest, as we shall see, was a task that had been set bun. The faith of Buddha which in the days of Atoka, and even so late as Kaniska, was still pure enough to be a noble inspiration, we now discover absolutely lost in a wilderness of preposterous rubbish, a philosophy of endless Buddhas, tales of manifestations and marvels like a Chris mas pantomime, immaculate conceptions by six-tusked elephants, charitable princes giving themselves up to be eaten by starving tigresses, temples built over a sacred nail-paring, and the like. We cannot give such aeries here; if the reader lies that sort of thing, he must go to the publications the Royal Asiatic Society or the India Society, where he will find a delirium of such imaginations. And in competition with this Buddhism, intellectually undermined as it now was and smothered in gilded decoration, Brahminism was everywhere gaining ground again, as Yuan Chwang notes with regret.

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Siva Purana
Translated by A Board of Scholars
Edited by Prof.J.L.Shastri
Published by Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi - 1970
VOLUME 1

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Page from a Dispersed Shiva Mahatmya
ca. 1710
India (Rajasthan, Mewar)
Ink and opaque watercolor on paper

� 2000�2015 The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Siva Purana
Translated by A Board of Scholars
Edited by Prof.J.L.Shastri
Published by Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi - 1970
VOLUME 2

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Shiva Flanked by Ganesha and Durga
Thailand, Prakhon Chai District, 8th century
Sculpture
Copper alloy

Source: Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Universities in Ancient India
By D.G.Apte
Published by Maharaja Sayaji Rao University, Baroda -1923

This brochure contains a brief account of the famous universities in Ancient India. The term 'university' as used here simply means a centre where higher education was imparted to aspiring students. It does not connote all the different features possessed by the universities in the East and the West to-day. There were a number of important features in these universities, which do not find a parallel in our modern institutions going under the name. The following brief account of these universities will enable the reader to have some idea of education imparted in these institutions during the long period of about 2,000 years beginning with the 10th century B.C. and ending with the I2th century A.D. It is hoped that a perusal of this booklet will enable him to compare our present institutions with those of ancient India and realise that the centres of higher learning in ancient India were unique in their organization and scholarship during those distant times when elsewhere in the world very few had thought of organised, education at the university level.

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The Hatha Yoga Pradipika
By Yogi Svatmarama
Translated by Pancham Sinh
First published in Ajmer - 1915

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The Ha?ha Yoga Prad?pik? (Sanskrit: ha?hay?gaprad?pik?, ??????????????) is a classic Sanskrit manual on hatha yoga, written by Sv?mi Sv?tm?r?ma, a disciple of Swami Gorakhnath. It is among the most influential surviving texts on the hatha yoga, and is one of the three classic texts of hatha yoga, the other two being the Gheranda Samhita and the Shiva Samhita. Another text, written at a later date by Srinivasabhatta Mahayogaindra, is the Hatharatnavali.

Different manuscripts of this work offer various versions of its title. The database of the A. C. Woolner manuscript project at the Library of the University of Vienna gives the following variant titles, gleaned from different manuscript colophons: Ha?hayogaprad?pik?, Ha?haprad?pik?, Ha?haprad?, Hath-Pradipika.

The text was written in 15th century CE. The author, Sv?tm?r?ma, incorporated older Sanskrit concepts into his popular synthesis.

The Ha?hayogaprad?pik? has been translated into English more than once.

The Ha?hayogaprad?pik? consists of four chapters which include information about asanas, pranayama, cakras, kundalini, bandhas, kriy?s, ?akti, n???s and mudr?s among other topics. It runs in the line of Hindu yoga (to distinguish from Buddhist and Jain yoga) and is dedicated to ?r? (Lord) ?di n?th? (Adinatha), a name for Lord Shiva (the Hindu god of destruction and renewal), who is believed to have imparted the secret of ha?ha yoga to his divine consort P?rvat?.

The Yoga Philosophy - Being the Text of Patanjali, with Bhoja Raja's Commentary
By Tookaram Tatya
Published by The Bombay Theosophical Fund, Bombay - 1885

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The Chakras of the Subtle Body
(folio 4 from the Siddha Siddhanta Paddhati Jodhpur, Rajasthan, 1824)

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The Hindu-Yogi - Science Of Breath
A Complete Manual of the Oriental Breathing Philosophy of Physical, Mental, Psychic and Spiritual Development
By Yogi Ramacharaka
Published by Yogi Publication Society, Chicago - 1904

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William Walker Atkinson (December 5, 1862 � November 22, 1932) was an attorney, merchant, publisher, and author, as well as an occultist and an American pioneer of the New Thought movement. He is also thought to be the author of the pseudonymous works attributed to Theron Q. Dumont and Yogi Ramacharaka.

In the 1890s, Atkinson had become interested in Hinduism and after 1900 he devoted a great deal of effort to the diffusion of yoga and Oriental occultism in the West. It is unclear at this late date whether he actually ever converted to any form of Hindu religion, or merely wished to write on the subject. If he did convert, he left no record of the event.

According to unverifiable sources, while Atkinson was in Chicago at the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893, he met one Baba Bharata, a pupil of the late Indian mystic Yogi Ramacharaka (1799 - c.1893). As the story goes, Bharata had become acquainted with Atkinson's writings after arriving in America, the two men shared similar ideas, and so they decided to collaborate. While editing New Thought magazine, it is claimed, Atkinson co-wrote with Bharata a series of books which they attributed to Bharata's teacher, Yogi Ramacharaka. This story cannot be verified and�like the "official" biography that falsely claimed Atkinson was an "English author"�it may be a fabrication.

No record exists in India of a Yogi Ramacharaka, nor is there evidence in America of the immigration of a Baba Bharata. Furthermore, although Atkinson may have travelled to Chicago to visit the 1892 - 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, where the authentic Indian yogi Swami Vivekananda attracted enthusiastic audiences, he is only known to have taken up residence in Chicago around 1900 and to have passed the Illinois Bar Examination in 1903.

Atkinson's claim to have an Indian co-author was actually not unusual among the New Thought and New Age writers of his era. As Carl T. Jackson made clear in his 1975 article The New Thought Movement and the Nineteenth Century Discovery of Oriental Philosophy,[5] Atkinson was not alone in embracing a vaguely exotic "orientalism" as a running theme in his writing, nor in crediting Hindus, Buddhists, or Sikhs with the possession of special knowledge and secret techniques of clairvoyance, spiritual development, sexual energy, health, or longevity.

The way had been paved in the mid to late 19th century by Paschal Beverly Randolph, who wrote in his books Eulis and Seership that he had been taught the mysteries of mirror scrying by the deposed Indian Maharajah Dalip Singh. Randolph was known for embroidering the truth when it came to his own autobiography (he claimed that his mother Flora Randolph, an African American woman from Virginia, who died when he was eleven years old, had been a foreign princess) but he was actually telling the truth�or something very close to it, according to his biographer John Patrick Deveney�when he said that he had met the Maharajah in Europe and had learned from him the proper way to use both polished gemstones and Indian "bhattah mirrors" in divination.[6]

In 1875, the year of Randolph's death, the Ukrainian-born Helena Petrovna Blavatsky founded the Theosophical Society, by means of which she spread the teachings of mysterious Himalayan enlightened yogis, the Masters of the Ancient Wisdom, and the doctrines of the Eastern philosophy in general. After this pioneer work, some representatives from known lineages of Indian and Asian spiritual and philosophical tradition like Vivekananda, Anagarika Dharmapala, Paramahansa Yogananda, and others, started coming to the West.

In any case, with or without a co-author, Atkinson started writing a series of books under the name Yogi Ramacharaka in 1903, ultimately releasing more than a dozen titles under this pseudonym. The Ramacharaka books were published by the Yogi Publication Society in Chicago and reached more people than Atkinson's New Thought works did. In fact, all of his books on yoga are still in print today.

- Wikipedia

The World's Parliament of Religions
An illustrated and popular story of the World's first parliament of religions, held in Chicago in connection with the Columbian exposition of 1893
By John Henry Barrows
Published by The Parliament Publishing Company, Chicago - 1893
Volume 1

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Swami Vivekananda on the Platform of the Parliament.
From left to right: Virchand Gandhi, Hewivitarne Dharmapala, Swami Vivekananda, and (possibly) G. Bonet Maury.
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The World's Parliament of Religions
An illustrated and popular story of the World's first parliament of religions, held in Chicago in connection with the Columbian exposition of 1893
By John Henry Barrows
Published by The Parliament Publishing Company, Chicago - 1893
Volume 2

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The Chicago Meeting, 1893

Vakataka - Gupta Age
Circa 200-550 A.D.
By Ramesh Chandra Majumdar and Anant Sadashiv Altekar
Reprinted by Motilal Banarsidass Publications - 1986
First published in 1967

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The V?k??aka Empire (Marathi: ??????) was a royal Indian dynasty that originated from the Deccan in the mid-third century CE. Their state is believed to have extended from the southern edges of Malwa and Gujarat in the north to the Tungabhadra River in the south as well as from the Arabian Sea in the western to the edges of Chhattisgarh in the east. They were the most important successors of the Satavahanas in the Deccan and contemporaneous with the Guptas in northern India.

The V?k??akas, like many coeval dynasties of the Deccan, claimed Buddhist origin. Little is known about Vindhya?akti (c. 250�270 CE), the founder of the family. Territorial expansion began in the reign of his son Pravarasena I. It is generally believed that the V?k??aka dynasty was divided into four branches after Pravarsena I. Two branches are known and two are unknown. The known branches are the Pravarpura-Nandivardhana branch and the Vatsagulma branch. The Gupta emperor Chandragupta II married his daughter into Vakataka royal family and with their support annexed Gujarat from the Saka Satraps in fourth century CE. The Vakataka power was followed by that of the Chalukyas of Badami in Deccan.

The Vakatakas are noted for having been patrons of the arts, architecture and literature. They led public works and their monuments are a visible legacy. The rock-cut Buddhist viharas and chaityas of Ajanta Caves (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) was built under the patronage of Vakataka Emperor Harishena.

Harishena (c.475 - 500) succeeded his father Devasena. He was a great patron of Buddhist architecture, art and culture. The World Heritage monument Ajanta is surviving example of his works. The rock cut architectural cell-XVI inscription of Ajanta states that he conquered Avanti (Malwa) in the north, Kosala (Chhattisgarh), Kalinga and Andhra in the east, Lata (Central and Southern Gujarat) and Trikuta (Nasik district) in the west and Kuntala (Southern Maharashtra) in the south. Varahadeva, a minister of Harishena and the son of Hastibhoja, excavated the rock-cut vihara of Cave XVI of Ajanta.[6] Three of the Buddhist caves at Ajanta, two viharas - caves XVI and XVII and a chaitya - cave XIX were excavated and decorated with painting and sculptures during the reign of Harishena.[8] According to an art historian, Walter M. Spink, all the rock-cut monuments of Ajanta excluding caves nos. 9,10,12,13 and 15A (Ref: Page No. 4, Ajanta-A Brief History and Guide - Walter M. Spink) were built during Harishena's reign though his view is not universally accepted. (Wikipedia)

Shivaji The Great
By Dr. Bal Krishna
Published by The Aryan Book Depot, Kolhapur - 1940

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Several distinguished Europeans had interviews with Shivaji, but they were too much engrossed in their immediate concerns. Though they had golden opportunities of talking with Shivaji and closely observing him, yet they did not leave any detailed account of his personality. Stephen Ustick went as an ambassador of the English from Bombay, in 1672, Thomas Niccolls in 1673, II. Oxenden in 1674, Samuell Austin, R. Jones and Edw. Austen in 1675, Lieut. Adames and Mr. Mauleverer in 1676, and John Child in 1678. Each of these envoys had interviews with the Raja. Similarly, the chief of the Dutch Factory at Teganapatam carried rich presents to Shivaji in a pompous procession and secured an interview with him in July 1677. The French envoy Sieur Germain from Pondichery visited the Raja on the bank of the Coleroon river in the same month. It is a pity that no sketch of his person is available from these envoys.

Shivaji is described by Escaliot on the evidence of those who had seen him, to be of medium stature and of excellent proportion. He was active in exercise, possessed quick and piercing eyes, and was whiter than any of his people. He seemed to smile whenever he spoke. His was a light weight of 140 Ibs English or at most 160 Ibs Dutch at the time of his coronation in June 1674 at the age of 44 years.

According to Thevenot, Shivaji was small in stature and tawny in complexion. " His eyes are very sharp and fiery, showing a great deal of intelligence. He usually takes one meal a day, and is quite healthy.*'

One Dutch envoy Abraham Lefeper visited Sh. at Rairi in 1672, Father P. J. d'Orleans describes him as 'a little lively, restless man, but with all his impatience he wanted neither decision nor manly bearing.'

Cosmo Da Guarda has fully confirmed the preceding remarks. He was not only quick in action but lively in carriage also, for with a clear and fair face, nature had given him the greatest perfections, specially the dark big eyes were so lively that they seemed to dart rays of fire. To these was added a quick, clear and acute intelligence."

Image:
Painting of Shivaji Maharaj by Valentyn 1656-1668.
The true likeness of Chattrapati Shivaji Maharaj released to the public at large in Pune on Shivjayanti in Shiv?ji Mandir 1933. The document was released by historian V.S. Bendrey under the auspices of Shaityacharya Na Chi Kelkar.

Deliverance or the escape of Shivaji the Great from Agra
By Rao Saheb G.K. alias Babasaheb Deshpande
Of the Clan Vishwamitra
Published by The Author, Poona - 1929

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Tiger claws reputed to have been used by Shivaji to kill Afzal Khan; Maratha, 17th century.

This weapon is reputed to be the one used by the Maratha leader Shivaji to kill Afzal Khan, the Mughal commander of the opposing Bijapur army in a famous episode that took place during the complicated political upheavals of 17th century India. During a protracted military engagement in 1659, the two men arranged a truce in order to meet in a tented enclosure, virtually alone. Both came armed: Shivaji wore mail under his clothes and metal skull protection under his turban. He also held metal "tiger claws" of this kind concealed in his hand. The two men fought and Shivaji disembowelled his opponent.

The claws are accompanied by a fitted case that is inscribed: "The 'Wagnuck' of Sivajee With Which He Killed the Moghul General. This Relic was given to Mr. James Grant-Duff of Eden. When he was Resident at Satara By the Prime Minister of the Peshwa of the Marathas".

Copyright: � V&A Images.

English Factory Records on Shivaji (1659 to 1682)
Published by Shivcharitra Karyalaya, Poona - 1931

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" If any portion of history merits more attention than others, it should seem that a period of a revolution in the State or the progress of the foundation of a new one demand the strictest investigation. Shivaji was the founder of the Mahratta Dominion, in the peninsula of India, and hitherto we have no account, either sufficiently accurate or sufficiently connected to follow his life. "

Thus wrote Robert Orme on the 26th of June 1779.

The factoy records are the early records of the proceedings of the East India Company's Agents and Factors in the East in their endeavours to establish factories and promote the trade of the English. These records chiefly consist of Diaries and consultations of the Council, copies of letters sent and received, and stray diaries and letterbooks of particular individuals.

Here we are publishing for the first time more than a thousand extracts from the letters and dispatches of contemporaries of Shivaji bearing on matters dealing with the life and work of Shivaji. The writers are writing about things which they had occasion to know personally or about things which they heard and they reported these because it was their business to do so. We have tried to preserve the old spelling and punctuation. In this record have been preserved also all the adjectives heaped from time to time on Shivaji so that students of history may be in a position to trace the several stages in contemporary public opinion between the "rebel" Shivaji and the crowned king.

Since these correspondents are narrating what they personally saw or heard when the things reported were actually happening round them we need not hereafter rely in order to present a sufficiently accurate and sufficiently connected account of such matters as are included herein on Chronicles Marathi or Mahomedan. Most of the Chronicles were written long after the events they record and are utterly lacking in historical perspective, are dominated by the idea of the miraculous and do not attempt at achieving accuracy either in fixing dates or in narrating incidents. They are also mostly vitiated by bias. Some of the papers which are printed here are nothing less than the letters and correspondence of the actors themselves or of those who were in immediate contact with them written at the time when the events reported were happening or as a part of the incidents themselves. This is first class material and anything else said or written subsequently from reports heard must rank lower. The writers of several letters are often times reporting things which they have only heard but these are contemporary reports and while appraising them as such they must have precedence over reports which have been subsequently collected.

The letters which are published here, were mostly exchanged between the parties in strict confidence in the course of and as a part of their regular work. The correspondents had not the slighest idea that their writings would ever be studied as materials for writing Maratha history. So at the time of writing these letters there was not present to the writer's mind any idea of writing for effect or for posterity. These letters were simple business letters in which a few facts are recorded as and when they occurred with such expression of opinion as is usually to be found when one partner of a firm writes to another partner who is at some distance, or the agents of a firm write to the head office and try to give them a true picture of the situation with which they have to deal. They had also to report such news as they heard in the course of their business so as to keep one another and also the head office well informed. But this they frankly stated to be news and nothing more.

Image:
Portrait of Shivaji; painting mounted onto an album folio. Inscribed. Album contains 26 paintings of Indian princes.
Mughal period
1680-1687

Inscription:
Sie�wagie gewezen
Maratise

Inscription Comment:
The inscription identifies the subject and probably means: 'this was Shivaji, founder of the Maratha state.'

� Trustees of the British Museum

Isa, Kena and Mundaka Upanishads and Sri Sankara's Commentary
Translated by S. Sitarama Sastri
Published by V.C. Seshacharri, Madras - 1905

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The Presidential Address of the 51st Session of the Indian National Congress - Delivered by: Sjt. SUBHAS CHANDRA BOSE
at Vithalnagar, Haripura - 1938
Published in Bangalore - 1938

The Indian National Congress met at Haripura during February 19 to 22, 1938, under the presidency of Subhas Chandra Bose; he was elected President of the Haripura Congress Session in 1938. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had selected Haripura for the convention. 51 Bullocks' chariot was decorated for this very occasion. Noted painter, Nandalal Bose also created set of seven posters at the request of Mahatma Gandhi for the Haripura Session, while film director, JBH Wadia, of Wadia Movietone Studio, made a full feature length documentary of the Haripura Congress.
(Wikipedia)

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REPORT of The Justice MUKHERJEE COMMISSION of Inquiry on the alleged disappearance of NETAJI Subhas Chandra Bose.

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The Justice Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry into the alleged disappearance of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, shortened as the Mukherjee Commission, was one-man board instituted in 1999 to inquire into the controversy surrounding the death of Subhas Chandra Bose in 1945. Justice Manoj Mukherjee, a retired judge of the Supreme Court of India, was appointed to lead the inquiry. After a 7 year inquiry, Mukherjee's findings that Bose did not die in the plane crash were rejected by the government.

On 30 April 1998, the High Court of Calcutta ordered the then BJP-led Government to "launch a vigorous inquiry as a special case for the purpose of giving an end to the controversy".

The Mukherjee Commission is not the first commission created to ascertain the death of Subhas Chandra Bose. The two previous commissions were the Shah Nawaz Committee (appointed by Jawaharlal Nehru) and Khosla Commission respectively. The Khosla Commission, created by the government of Indira Gandhi, reported that all documents relating to Subhas Chandra Bose were either missing or destroyed.

Findings:
The Mukherjee Commission concluded that while Bose was presumed dead given the many years that had passed, he did not die in the plane crash in Taipei in 1945. Instead the commission proposed that the crash was a ruse to allow Bose to escape with the knowledge of the Taiwan and Japanese governments of the time. The Indian government was said to have learned of the escape through a Taiwanese report in 1956, which it chose to suppress. According to the commission the ashes kept in Tokyo's Renk?ji Temple that are commonly believed to be Bose's, instead were the remains of Ichiro Okura, a Taiwanese army-man who died in August 1945. The commission did not find any evidence that Bhagwanji, a monk who lived in Faridabad until his death in 1985, was in fact Bose in disguise.
(Wikipedia)

Image:
Clipping from Japanese newspaper, published on 23 August 1945, reporting the death of Bose and General Tsunamasa Shidei of the Japanese Kwantung Army in Japanese-occupied Manchuria.
(Wikipedia)

AZAD HIND Newsletter
Monthly for a Free India
Editor: Pandit K.A.Bhatta
Published by Kurt Vowinckel Verlag, Berlin - 1942
In German and English

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Bengal and Assam, Behar and Orissa : Their history, people, commerce and industrial resources
By Somerset Playne and J.W. Bond
Edited by Arnold Wright
Published by The Foreign and Colonial Compiling & Publishing Co., London - 1917

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Early Roman Catholic Missions To India: With sketches of Jesuitism, Hindu philosophy, and the Christianity of the ancient Indo-Syrian Church of Malabar
By James Forbes Bisset Tinling
Published by S.W.Partridge & Co., Bristol - 1871

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Madonna and Child in a domestic interior
Painting by Manohar (active ca. 1582�1624)
Mughal
17th century
India
Black and colored ink and gold on paper

� The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The History of Christianity in India : From the commencement of the Christian era
By James Hough
Published by Seeley, Burnside and Seeley, London - 1845

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Madonna and Child, opaque watercolour on paper, Deccan, 18th century.

Painting, in opaque watercolour on paper, with gold, depicting a Madonna with child, with an attendant bearing a dish of fruit.

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Sri Hanuman Chalisa
By B.Hanumantha Rao
Published by Bapatla Venkata Parthasarathy, Guntur - 1965
In Telugu

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Hanuman Conversing
Chola period (880�1279 AD)
11th century
India (Tamil Nadu)
Copper alloy

Hanuman, adviser to King Sugriva of the great monkey clan, is one of the most appealing Hindu deities. His bravery, courage, and loyalty throughout the Ramayana are renowned. Here, Hanuman gestures obeisance to Rama with his raised left hand while engaging in animated discussion with his Lord. This sculpture was part of an ensemble at the center of which were Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana. It was included among an assemblage of processional icons kept by Vaishnava temples in south India for festival use. Typical of Chola-period representations, Hanuman has assumed anthropomorphic form, with only his face and tail confirming his monkey identity. Among the finest bronze images of Hanuman to have survived from the Chola kingdom of south India, this work embodies his noble, virtuous character with great sensitivity.

� The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The Surgical Instruments of the Hindus
With a comparative study of the surgical instruments of the Greek, Roman, Arab and the modern European surgeons.
By Girindranath Mukhopadhyaya
Published by Calcutta University, Calcutta - 1913
In Two Volumes

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The Ashtadhyayi of PANINI
Translated into English by Srisa Chandra Vas
Published by Sindhu Charan Bose, at the Panini Office in Benares - 1897
Volume 6
In Sanskrit

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Panini was born in Shalatula, a town near to Attock on the Indus river in present day Pakistan. The dates given for Panini are pure guesses. Experts give dates in the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th century BC and there is also no agreement among historians about the extent of the work which he undertook. What is in little doubt is that, given the period in which he worked, he is one of the most innovative people in the whole development of knowledge. We will say a little more below about how historians have gone about trying to pinpoint the date when Panini lived.

Panini was a Sanskrit grammarian who gave a comprehensive and scientific theory of phonetics, phonology, and morphology. Sanskrit was the classical literary language of the Indian Hindus and Panini is considered the founder of the language and literature. It is interesting to note that the word "Sanskrit" means "complete" or "perfect" and it was thought of as the divine language, or language of the gods.

A treatise called Astadhyayi (or Astaka ) is Panini's major work. It consists of eight chapters, each subdivided into quarter chapters. In this work Panini distinguishes between the language of sacred texts and the usual language of communication. Panini gives formal production rules and definitions to describe Sanskrit grammar. Starting with about 1700 basic elements like nouns, verbs, vowels, consonants he put them into classes. The construction of sentences, compound nouns etc. is explained as ordered rules operating on underlying structures in a manner similar to modern theory. In many ways Panini's constructions are similar to the way that a mathematical function is defined today. Joseph writes in [2]:-

[Sanskrit's] potential for scientific use was greatly enhanced as a result of the thorough systemisation of its grammar by Panini. ... On the basis of just under 4000 sutras [rules expressed as aphorisms], he built virtually the whole structure of the Sanskrit language, whose general 'shape' hardly changed for the next two thousand years. ... An indirect consequence of Panini's efforts to increase the linguistic facility of Sanskrit soon became apparent in the character of scientific and mathematical literature. This may be brought out by comparing the grammar of Sanskrit with the geometry of Euclid - a particularly apposite comparison since, whereas mathematics grew out of philosophy in ancient Greece, it was ... partly an outcome of linguistic developments in India.

Joseph goes on to make a convincing argument for the algebraic nature of Indian mathematics arising as a consequence of the structure of the Sanskrit language. In particular he suggests that algebraic reasoning, the Indian way of representing numbers by words, and ultimately the development of modern number systems in India, are linked through the structure of language.

Panini should be thought of as the forerunner of the modern formal language theory used to specify computer languages. The Backus Normal Form was discovered independently by John Backus in 1959, but Panini's notation is equivalent in its power to that of Backus and has many similar properties. It is remarkable to think that concepts which are fundamental to today's theoretical computer science should have their origin with an Indian genius around 2500 years ago.

At the beginning of this article we mentioned that certain concepts had been attributed to Panini by certain historians which others dispute. One such theory was put forward by B Indraji in 1876. He claimed that the Brahmi numerals developed out of using letters or syllables as numerals. Then he put the finishing touches to the theory by suggesting that Panini in the eighth century BC (earlier than most historians place Panini) was the first to come up with the idea of using letters of the alphabet to represent numbers.

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