Many Skipped Event

NEW DELHI: When was Ram born? January 10, 12.05 hours, 5114 BC. When did the war in Mahabharata start? October 13, 3139 BC. And when did Hanuman meet Sita in Ashok Vatika? September 12, 5076 BC.What historians, here and abroad, say is impossible to establish, has been accomplished by one Institute of Scientific Research — or so the institute claims in its ongoing 'Unique Exhibition on Cultural Continuity from Rig Veda to Robotics'. And India's culture minister, Mahesh Sharma , says his ministry will take cognisance of this information and has sought a report."I spent a good one-and-ahalf hours at the exhibition and there is a lot of material there which merits attention," Sharma told ET.And how was this dating done? "Considerable research" and a software procured for around Rs 7,000 from the US were the keys apparently. "Planetary information" from the Rig Veda, Ramayana and Mahabharata was used to find the exact dates , said Saroj Bala, director of the institute. Hosted at Delhi's Lalit Kala Akademi, the institute's 'findings' have been submitted to the Union culture ministry.Sharma launched the exhibition on Thursday. Sharing the spotlight with him was RSS Joint General Secretary Krishna Gopal. The minister told ET: "We have asked them to compile all of this information and submit a report on this important issue. There have been allegations and questions raised about the very existence of Mahabharata and Ramayana. This exhibition gives scientific basis for all of this."The minister's comments made earlier to a TV channel on the late APJ Abdul Kalam being a nationalist despite being a Muslim created a controversy on Friday.Among other notable invitees at the exhibition were Archeological Survey of India Director-General Rakesh Tewari and Delhi University Vice-Chancellor Dinesh Singh. But they didn't attend the event.Bala said HRD Minister Smriti Irani did not respond to an invitation. "We were very keen that the HRD minister also come, but they did not respond," the director said."We have shared the findings with the culture ministry. We are now engaging actively with the government and that is why the culture minister came for the exhibition. He also said he was open to looking at this issue afresh. We are hopeful the culture ministry will take this into account," Bala said.Explaining the institute's method, the director said: "The epics give precise information about which planet was placed where when Lord Ram was born. We simply mapped it on to the software that yielded a skyview and finally the exact date and time of birth. We used the same for dating of the exile of Pandavas, the Mahabharata war, the birth time and date for Bharat, Shatrughan, etc, the exact date when Bali was killed and so on. So these are not mythologies but facts, and that's what the exhibition seeks to establish."