OUTLOOK on Rajaram's Fraud & Fantasy

[Michael Witzel]

A short version of Steve Farmer's and my paper on Rajaram's & Jha's
'decipherment' of the Indus script and the inherent Piltdown Horse has just
now appeared in the Indian news magazine OUTLOOK (Nov. 6)

http://www.outlookindia.com/20001106/features3.htm

-- hardly a "communist rag", as some have called the bearer of our first
communication, FRONTLINE:

http://www.indiaserver.com/frontline/2000/09/30/
(NB: watch out for Rajaram's answer and for some more discussion
forthcoming in Frontline!)

However, the Outlook editors have made a few small changes, one serious.
They have added:

"(In other words, the prevalence of the horse will disprove the
  commonly-accepted theory that the speakers of Indo-Aryan came from
outside and were
  responsible for the disintegration of the Indus Civilisation.)"

I had advised them to change that addition to:

"(The prevalence of the horse would disprove the commonly-accepted theory
that the
speakers of Indo-Aryan ("Aryans") came from outside; however,
archaeologists no longer maintain that they were also responsible for the
disintegration of the Indus civilization.) "

But, it must have slipped past the editors. Oh well, one more (wrongly
attributed) quote to live with!  Apparently, Wheeler's "Indra stands
accused" is firmly ensconsed in the minds...

MW>



========================================================
Michael Witzel
Department of Sanskrit & Indian Studies, Harvard University
2 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge MA 02138, USA

ph. 1- 617-496 2990 (also messages)
home page:  http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm

Elect. Journ. of Vedic Studies:  http://www1.shore.net/~india/ejvs