Saraswati & Indus Valley Civilization.
Two Different Civilizations, One buried & the Other Misinterpreted.
When one talks of the great civilizations what comes to mind first is the Indus Valley System & the civil engineering marvels which were well ahead of its time. But what is forgotten is another river system & civilization much older to Indus Valley, The Saraswati Civilization.
There are a lot of talks in the west over the greatness of Indus Valley which is just for one reason, to promote the Aryan Invasion Theory. As there are missing motifs & symbols or no proper evidence linking it to the native culture of what people followed & preached then, this theory fits in right there.
The fact of the migration theory is the other way around, people migrated to the west from Indus valley, the area was called ‘Druhyu’ those days. As the word Hindu or Hinduism did not exist then, people who migrated and settled in distant lands were named after the region or the ruler they followed but all had one thing in common, they followed One Dharma — The Eternal Truth, which is the reason you find many Pagan Gods similar to Hindu Gods & Goddesses. Also Many who migrated were followers of Brahaspati & Shukracharya.
On the other hand Saraswati Civilization did not die totally, only the river dried, people still worship the same gods & at the same places. The region in which the Saraswati flowed ran parallel to Indus but within the present borders of India. The land was called Maru, which came to be known as Marwad later on. The river also coursed through areas of Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana & Gujarat. The famous Mahabharata war was fought by the dried up Saraswati which was reduced to pools then at a place near present day Kurukshetra. The major reason for drying up of the perennial Saraswati was the tectonic shifts at Dun valley and the regions around, which continued with a series of earthquakes changing the course of Yamuna and blocking the mouth of Saraswati. This made the forested area, semi-arid gradually because of water scarcity. As the area of the river course was a little towards the east, it did not influence the formation of the totally arid Thar Desert. It was formed before the river totally dried up during the times of Ramayana when an arrow or an astra was shot by Lord Rama towards the present day Jaisalmer from the coast of Rameswaram which turned an abundant forested area into a Sandy Desert.
River Saraswati is mentioned in many Rig vedic texts as it was written down by the banks of the river itself (before that it was transferred orally). One such verse says of the five visible points of the Saraswati (at a few points it flowed underground).
II Rudravarte Kurukshetre Pushkare ShriSthale tatha
Prabhase Panchame Teerthe Panch Prachi Saraswati II
This means one swaroop of Saraswati is Rudravarta (Mount Kailash),
the second is Kurukshetra,
the third Pushkar,
the fourth Siddhakshetra (Sidhpur) &
the fifth Prabhas (Somnath).
All these points or places are still places of worship, infact Sidhpur in Gujarat still has river Saraswati flowing by the once mighty Rudra Mahalaya Temple. Drying up of the river made the place inhabitable so a few shifted to the east towards the Ganga while a few moved southwards, who are now called Saraswat Bramhins, led by Lord Parashurama. A few stayed back which included the inhabitant tribe of the Bhils, but they shifted their base from Bhilmal to more greener pastures and the mountain passes of the Aravalli. Ekalavya is one of the known personalities from the Bhil Tribe.
Many believe the river would have ended in the Rann of Kutchh but that could also be the Ghagghar-Hakra River system which was non-perennial. Going by the above Rig Vedic verse it also makes sense the river had its mouth at Somnath as there are many archaeological sites in that course as well.
While there are many theories of its course and tributaries, it still intrigues and gets a person curious discussing the mighty Saraswati, the river that disappeared!!
Or Not!
