'The Sarasvati was more sacred

than Ganga'
Declares Michel Danino- the French Scholar and
famous historian, in this interview to Vaihayasi Pande
Daniel, who loves all things India, especially her
Spirituality.

The Ganges and below- a detailed mapping of the now

lost Sarasvathi river.

At the edge of the Shola forest, at the foot of the

Ayyasamy Hills, in western Tamil Nadu, near
Coimbatore, lives a writer and scholar who traveled to
India [ Images ] from northern France [ Images ] over
three decades ago and never went home.
Michel Danino, who 'loves chapattis, sambar, yoga
and everything Indian', has devoted his life to studying
Indian culture/heritage and history, authoring several
books both in French and English on India.
Danino, who hails from a Jewish family who migrated
from Morocco to France, has had a life-long fascination
with India's ancient wisdom, marveling at the ageless
traditions that have kept its civilization alive and
relevant centuries later, like for instance the special
status accorded to nature… 'Since the start of the
Judeo-Christian tradition, the West broke away from
Nature and began regarding her as so much inanimate
matter to be exploited (a polite word for plunder). The
contrast with the ancient Indian attitude is as stark as
could be. Indian tradition regards the earth as a
goddess, Bhudevi', he says in Sri Aurobindo and Indian
Civilization.
His books examine key Indian historical issues or
wrestle with the cultural concerns present-day India
faces. The Invasion That Never Was (1996) looks at the
theories about the arrival/existence of the Aryans while
The Indian Mind Then and Now(2000), Is Indian Culture
Obsolete? are more sociological studies.
His latest book, The Lost River: On the Trail of the
Sarasvati (2010) focuses on the importance of this once
key river and its connection with Vedic culture and
Harappan civilizations. In addition to writing, teaching
and lecturing, Danino tellsVaihayasi Pande Daniel, he is
interested in conserving nature and was able to
jumpstart a movement to protect the Shola forest he
lives by the side of.
Why did you decide to live in India?
I was born and brought up in France. On the surface,
everything around me was fine: my family was a happy
one, my studies went well, and so on.
But I felt something essentially lacking in what life, as it
was organized there, had to offer, despite an
undeniably rich French culture. When I was 15 or so, I
stumbled on literature related to Indian spirituality, and
instantly felt that there was something that held
essential keys. I read several of the great masters,
something of India's ancient literature, and finally
decided that Sri Aurobindo's view of life and the world
was what I was looking for. It was not a passing craze
or a 'New Age' fad; it not only satisfied the intellect but
also touched the core of the being.
I came to India when I was just 21, after four years of
higher scientific studies. I stayed at Auroville for a few
years, then lived in the Nilgiris for over two decades,
and I have now been settled near Coimbatore for seven
years.
Throughout, my central purpose remained the same: to
study and practise the tools of self-discovery that India
has worked out over ages, and also to explore the roots
and beginnings of Indian civilization.
Tell us about your relationship with India. What are the
positives? And the negatives/disappointments? And
how do you describe India to folks back home?

Well, 'home' is India… and I gave up trying to describe

it long ago! Western societies, in comparison, seem to
me paper-thin. Here, the endless layering and
complexity are mind-boggling. I have always lived in
rural parts of south India, not in the cities — which I find
maddening — and everyday get reminded that this is
not a "nation" in the modern sense of the term — many
Western nations are recent and artificial creations —
but a civilization with millennial roots.
The 'positives' are obvious to me: A great degree of
cultural integration, clearly the result of a centuries-old
process, an unrivalled respect for cultural difference
and spiritual freedom, a sense of the divine presence in
the creation, all of which results in a generally fine
human substance.
As for the 'negatives', I am afraid they are all too
conspicuous: almost every Indian I meet knows that the
country's progress is hampered by an antediluvian
political class and administration that lack vision and
competence and promote a culture of spinelessness
and mediocrity; by a stinking, all-pervasive corruption
which the average Indian is reluctant or unable to fight;
by a lack of civic conscience and by a debilitating
educational system that takes pride in producing
brainless machines. Some of these millstones around
India's neck have a colonial legacy, but there is no
point blaming the British when we have had six
decades to rebuild the nation.
What is the Indian archaeology scene like? Is there
good work happening? Is good work getting enough
support?
A lot of good work is taking place in Indian archaeology,
most of it silently. You will get to know about it only if
you attend conferences or read specialized journals and
books. From Palaeolithic to medieval or even colonial
times, hundreds of sites are explored across the
country at any given time.
Yet there is undeniably a huge scope for improvement:
state-of-the-art methods are rarely available, some
artefacts or bone remains are misplaced or forgotten,
dating methods are applied scantily, reports are often
written late or not at all, few sites are adequately
protected after excavation, good museums are rare,
funds are inadequate, etc — in a word, a lot of precious
data is wasted or lost.
The field is crying for modernization, including a closer
collaboration with India's leading scientific institutions.
This is urgent, because unexcavated sites are
disappearing every day: in the Gangetic plains, for
instance, agriculture, exploding cities and
'development' are permanently blocking access to
more and more potentially rich sites. Much of our
ancient history is getting erased even before we get to
know it. We need far more effective heritage policies.
How did you get interested in the course of the
Sarasvati?
Studying India's roots soon takes you to the Indus or
Harappan civilization. As I explained in my book, from
1941 onward, Harappan sites were discovered -- by
Marc Aurel Stein to begin with -- along the dry bed of a
river locally called Ghaggar-Hakra. It so happens that
since the mid-nineteenth century, this river had been
identified with the Vedic Sarasvati: matching the Rig-
Veda's descriptions, it is located between the Yamuna
and the Sutlej, could be traced 'from the mountain to
the sea', and a small 'Sarsuti' or Sarasvati still exists in
its upper reaches (in Haryana).
Then comes the big question: If the Ghaggar-Hakra was
indeed the Sarasvati river — and the scholarly
consensus says it was — where do we find traces of a
Vedic culture in its basin? Paradoxically, the Harappan
culture, which is conventionally regarded as 'pre-Vedic',
is the dominant culture of the region while the
Sarasvati was flowing. These are some of the questions
I have tried to explore, of course building on the work
of many scholars.
Your interest in the Sarasvati as a foreigner must have
opened a lot of doors in India given its mythological
importance.
Technically, I am not a 'foreigner': I adopted Indian
citizenship some years ago. But you are right that
many Indians are often intrigued by my interest in the
Indus civilization, the lost Sarasvatî, and the origins of
Indian culture. They often react by saying that I am
'more Indian than Indians', which is rather flattering…
But after a while, the skin's colour makes no difference.
In the course of my many lectures — especially in
institutions of higher learning, such as IITs, universities,
etc —
I have found a considerable level of interest in these
questions. Naturally enough: they are intimately linked
to questions of origin and identity that resonate deeply
in many Indians. Yet, with a few brilliant exceptions,
there is a great dearth of material accessible to the
layman, who is often confused by not-so-genuine
literature; I thought I would try and help bridge the gap.
Any reason why Sarasvati is not considered as sacred
as Ganga?
As long as it flowed, the Sarasvati was more sacred
than Ganga, not less. In the Rig-Veda, Ganga is
mentioned twice in passing and given no importance
whatsoever, while of all the rivers mentioned, Sarasvati
alone is deified.
Paradoxically, the goddess seems to grow in stature as
the river dried up in stages; that is what the later
literature reflects. At the same time, many of
Sarasvati's attributes were transferred to Ganga, so
that in classical times, Ganga had gained in
prominence — naturally enough, since it was also the
lifeline of the new civilization.
Today, ironically, we cannot rule out a Sarasvati-like
end to the Gangetic rivers. The difference is that if it
happens, it will be a man-made tragedy.
You have spoken/written earlier about the
value/importance of Hindu wisdom especially in
connection with nature.
The old Indian attitude towards nature — not just Hindu
but also Buddhist, Jain, and of course tribal — is to
regard her as sacred: the creation, Bhudevi, is divine,
without any dichotomy with the creator: 'Heaven is my
father; my mother is this vast earth,' says the Rig-Veda.
The universe is compared to a thousand-branched tree
or sometimes to a cow (hence, for instance, the
symbolism of Krishna and the cows).
This attitude found itself reflected in rituals associated
with trees, wells or tanks: planting a tree or digging a
well or a pond were activities regarded as highly
meritorious even on the religious level, as many
inscriptions confirm. Historically, we findAshoka's edicts
prohibiting hunting and cruelty to animals, or Kautilya
prescribing the maintenance of wildlife sanctuaries.
Indians also excelled at water harvesting, right from
Harappan times — see Dholavira's colossal reservoirs
and network of drains.
But while some communities — take the Bishnois of
Rajasthan [ Images ] or the Todas of Tamil Nadu — are
famous for their spiritual bond with nature, the average
Hindu has lost it. He may worship a tree at a temple,
but will not mind deforestation at his doorstep; he will
travel to a distant pilgrimage spot but will litter it with
plastic bags and other garbage, and he will be
generally unaware of the all-round environmental
degradation his children are bound to inherit from him.
I also have found many 'educated' Indians scared at the
very thought of entering a forest. It is hard to account
for this deep disconnect in the Hindu psyche.
Do you feel India is losing touch with her epics even as
the rest of the world is very slowly realizing their value?
I don't feel that India is losing touch with the Ramayana
[ Images ] or the Mahabharata [ Images ]. See how
popular the television serials were a few years ago: the
country virtually ground to a halt during their
broadcast.
What is neglected is the epics' educational potential:
for centuries, in the simplest but the most effective
way, they taught Indians the nuances of dharma.
Today, with the mistaken belief that dharma means
religion, we have excluded it from our uninspiring
education, and of course from public life, while it was,
in many ways, the one ideal placed in front of all
sections of the society.
If you follow dharma, as a ruler you will work for lasting
improvements, especially for the weaker sections of the
society, rather than distribute sops to people while
robbing them; as a citizen, you will put up a fight
against injustice or corruption; as a teacher you will try
to enlighten the minds of your students rather than
stultify them. And so forth.
I do not wish to oversimplify things and romantically
suggest that all will be tiptop if we read and preach the
epics; I only mean that every country and society needs
some cultural values as guides. The values projected in
the epics are certainly time-tested, and they are more
profound than our superficial and rootless
'humanitarian' values.
Didn't the British do a better job of tracking India's
history, tradition and culture than Indians are doing
today? The best work on India is probably still authored
by Westerners.
I don't think so. There is much excellent work produced
in India, but it doesn't always receive the exposure it
deserves.
True, some Western archaeologists scholars have
contributed a lot of great value, especially those who
have had a genuine interest in India. Others have been
swayed by biases or the colonial baggage of
stereotypes. The British, as you say, did produce much
valuable material, but also implanted into the minds,
including Indian minds, a lot of disparaging notions that
still litter our textbooks. And even today, we find a few
rare but vociferous scholars indulging in outright
demonization of Indian culture.
I have been strongly opposed to the hollow kind of
glorification of ancient India that is too often seen in
India. It is historically untenable and does not help
towards an intelligent understanding of those times. No
society can be perfect and we should allow the
evidence to speak for itself as objectively as possible.
Ironically, today's Indology is founded on the unstated
diktat that you can be an Indologist only if you are an
outsider. This leads to many absurd and often abusive
misinterpretations and misrepresentations.
I am convinced that whatever your erudition may be,
you can study ancient India profitably only if you have
some empathy with the fundamentals of Indian culture.
In the end, however, I am not personally keen on an
opposition Western vs India. Some Westerners have
been perfectly at home with things Indian, while some
Indians look like perfect aliens. Let us refrain from cut-
and-dried formulas. If India still has something to offer
to the world, its culture will live.

Interview courtesy
-Vaihayasi Pande Daniel