N. S. Rajaram

Navaratna Srinivasa Rajaram (born 1943 in Mysore, India) is an Indian mathematician, who is however notable for his publications with the Voice of India publishing house focusing on the "Indigenous Aryans" controversy in Indian politics, in some instances in co-authorship with David Frawley.He's also a member of Folks Magazine's Editorial Board since 2009^[1].

Professional career

Rajaram holds a Ph.D. degree in mathematics from Indiana University, and has published papers on statistics in the 1970s [6][7] and on artificial intelligence [8][9] and robotics[10] in the 1980s.

Indian history

Rajaram has published on topics related to ancient Indian history and Indian archeology, alleging Eurocentric bias in mainstream Indology and Sanskrit scholarship, arguing within the "Indigenous Aryans" ideology instead. According to Rajaram,

"Indology is a ‘secular eschatology’ built around a Euro-centric view of the world... Its creators were driven mainly by European colonial and Christian missionary interests."^{[citation needed]}

Rajaram's work and publications claim to expose the "lack of scientific methodology" that has gone into the field of Indology. He has criticized the process by which, he says, eurocentric 19th century "Indologists / missionaries" arrived at many of their conclusions. Rajaram questions how it was possible for 19th century European evangelical "Indologists / missionaries" to study and develop hypotheses on Indian history, claiming many of them were "functionally illiterate" in Indian languages, including even the fundamental classical language, Sanskrit, suggesting that "every available modern tool from archaeology to computer science" be used to "clearing away the cobwebs cast by questionable linguistic theories" as he chooses to refer to mainstream historical linguistics and philology.^[2]

Rajaram has also published on historical Indian mathematics found in the Sulbasutras and the Vedas.

Criticism

Rajaram's contributions are characterized by physicist and pseudoscience expert Alan Sokal as pseudoscience,^[3] and by Asko Parpola as "trash" and "crude" or "nonsensical" propaganda.^{[4] [5]}

Rajaram's and Jha's claim of having deciphered the Indus script was universally rejected. Regarding the history of the horse in South Asia, ^[6] Asko Parpola, professor of Indology at Helsinki University, stated that^[4]

“

It is sad that India's heritage should be exploited by some individuals — usually people with little or no academic credentials — who for political or personal motives are ready even to falsify evidence. In order to vindicate their ideology and promote their own ends, these persons appeal to the feelings of the 'common man' who, with full reason, is proud of his or her country's grand heritage. Thus far Rajaram has got away with this dishonesty because the scholarly community has not considered this work worthy of consideration: it has been taken more or less for granted that any sensible person can see through this trash and recognize it as such. However, the escalation of this nonsensical propaganda now demands the issue to be addressed.

”

Indus script expert Iravatham Mahadevan likewise dismisses Jha-Rajaram 'decipherment' as a "non-starter" and "completely invalid",^[7] and on Rajaram's contributions to the opus specifically judges that

"Rajaram's outbursts speak for themselves and need no annotation. The first part of the book is not about academic research on the technical problem of deciphering an unknown script. It is crude communal propaganda with obvious political overtones, betraying deep mistrust of foreigners and alien ideologies and intolerance towards religious and linguistic minorities."^[8]

Works

• Aryan Invasion of India: The Myth and the Truth (New Delhi : Voice of India, 1993) ISBN 81-85990-12-3.
• The politics of history : Aryan invasion theory and the subversion of scholarship (New Delhi : Voice of India, 1995) ISBN 81-85990-28-X.
• with David Frawley, The Vedic "Aryans" and the origins of civilization : a literary and scientific perspective (St-Hyacinthe, Québec : World Heritage Press, 1995) ISBN 1-896064-00-0, 2nd rev. enl. ed. (New Delhi : Voice of India, 1997) ISBN 81-85990-36-0.
• Secularism : the new mask of fundamentalism : religious subversion of secular affairs (New Delhi : Voice of India, 1995) ISBN 81-85990-34-4.
• The Dead Sea scrolls and the crisis of Christianity : an Eastern view of a Western crisis (London : Minerva, 1997) ISBN 1-86106-206-0.
• with David Frawley, A Hindu view of the world : essays in the intellectual kshatriya tradition (New Delhi : Voice of India, 1998) ISBN 81-85990-52-2.
• Gandhi, Khilafat and the national movement : a revisionist view based on neglected sources (Bangalore : Sahitya Sindhu Prakashan, 1999) ISBN 81-86595-15-5.
• Christianity's scramble for India and the failure of the secularist elite (New Delhi : Hindu Writers' Forum, 1999) ISBN 81-86970-09-6.
• From Sarasvati river to the Indus script : a scientific journey into the origins of the Vedic Age (Bangalore, Karnataka, India : [Mitra Maadhyama,][11] 1999).
• Profiles in deception : Ayodhya and the Dead Sea scrolls (New Delhi : Voice of India, 2000) ISBN 81-85990-65-4.
• Nationalism and distortions in Indian history : causes, consequences and cure (Bangalore : Naimisha Research Foundation, 2000).
• with N. Jha, The Deciphered Indus Script (New Delhi : Aditya Prakashan, 2000) ISBN 81-7742-015-1.
• with David Frawley, The Vedic Aryans and the origins of civilization : a literary and scientific perspective, 3rd ed. with three supplements (New Delhi : Voice of India, 2001) ISBN 81-85990-36-0.
• Nostradamus and beyond : visions of yuga-sandhi (New Delhi : Rupa, 2002) ISBN 81-7167-954-4.
• "Sarasvati River and the Vedic Civilization: History, science and politics," (Aditya Prakashan, New Delhi, 2006), ISBN 8177420661

Notes

1. ^ Magazine, Folks. "Folks Magazine's Editorial Board". http://folks.co.in/about/management-team/. Retrieved 28 August 2011. 
2. ^ Rajaram 1995, page 230, (cited in Bryant 2001 page 74
3. ^ Rajaram's claim that Many of the questions arising in Quantum Physics today had been anticipated by Swami Vivekananda heads the chapter on Hindu nationalism in Alan Sokal's 2004 essay on Pseudoscience and Postmodernism
4. ^ ^{a b} A. Parpola, Of Rajaram's 'Horses', 'decipherment' and civilisational issues,
5. ^ [Frontline (magazine)|Frontline]], November 2000 [1]
6. ^ [2], [3]
7. ^ I. Mahadevan, One sees what one wants to, Frontline, November 2000 [4].
8. ^ Mahadevan, Iravatham, Aryan or Dravidian or Neither? A Study of Recent Attempts to Decipher the Indus Script (1995-2000) EJVS (ISSN 1084-7561) vol. 8 (2002) issue 1 (March 8).[5]

See also

• Indigenous Aryans
• Aryan invasion theory
• Nationalism and ancient history

References

• Alan D. Sokal, Pseudoscience and Postmodernism: Antagonists or Fellow-Travelers? in: Archaeological Fantasies: How Pseudoarchaeology Misrepresents the Past and Misleads the Public, ed. Fagan (2004).
• "Horseplay in Harappa" review by Witzel & Farmer, Frontline, October 2000.
• A Tale of Two Horses, Frontline, November 2000, includes:
  • N. S. Rajaram, "Frontline Cover has 'the head of a horse'" [12]
  • "Jha sent the photo... I have not computer enhanced it" (interview with Rajaram)
  • A. Parpola, Of Rajaram's 'Horses', 'decipherment' and civilisational issues
  • I. Mahadevan One sees what one wants to [13]
  • Witzel & Farmer, New Evidence on the 'Piltdown Horse' Hoax

External links

• Further Articles by Rajaram

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Name	Rajaram, N. S.
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Date of birth	1943
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