Start this weekend reading about “Maccha Yantra” – which might have been the precursor to the mariner’s compass of today…
Next, read former Governor of J&K, Jagmohan’s account of  his trek to Amarnath…
…and finally, ponder over Chandan Mitra’s provocative piece on the purpose of history
Excerpts from all the three articles below, as always.

Many of you must have read a report in The Hindu from a few weeks ago by unnamed “Eminent Historians” titled, “From ‘India Shining’ to ‘India was Shining’“. The report (dt. 3rd May) appeared to be an amateurish attempt at trashing some of the claims made in the BJP’s manifesto regarding India’s past and heritage.
It had excerpts from the BJP’s manifesto and brief counter-points dismissing the claims and assertions. Curiously – in spite of being authored by “Eminent Historians” – it was surprisingly light on references and historical sources.
Dr. …

From a recent article in VC Circle:
Global warming, air pollution and other problems related to the emission of Co2 (carbon dioxide) may partially get solved as a group of five scientists from four institutes have discovered a low cost method of converting carbon dioxide into calcium carbonate (CaCo3), a useful building material.
…The scientists have discovered naturally occurring bacteria that can be used to convert Co2 into CaCo3, that can be used in cement or limestone aggregate for building roads. When used as an enzyme, biomolecules that speed up the chemical …

At first glance, Nandan Nilekani’s “Imagining India” is daunting.
500+ pages, densely packed with statistics, policy prescriptions and anecdotes do not make for easy bedtime reading…yet I found it highly engaging and written in a very readable style. If there was ever a book you wished that reflected a bird’s eye of what ails India, “Imagining India” would come pretty close to it.
On the very first page, in the preface, Nandan Nilekani recalls a conversation with a visitor in which he was asked:
“Why don’t people like you get into politics?”
Nilekani’s …

A few hours ago, ISRO put “Chandrayaan-I”  into transfer orbit around the earth, heralding its “Mission to Moon”.
This is a proud moment for the team at ISRO working tirelessly for the last several months, sometimes right through the night.
It is also a proud moment for India’s indigenous space research programme and more broadly, India’s indigenous R&D efforts - the seeds of which were planted barely a few decades ago.
But questions are being asked…and doubts are being raised.
“Was this the best use of the country’s limited resources?”, “What will this mission really achieve?”, “Will it have any impact on …

Like most of you, I watched and read about the proceedings of the last few days with a sense of sadness and great shame…Amidst all this, these words by Radha Rajan touched a raw nerve… Please read and think…(emphasis added)
*** The Nation as Draupadi ***
Parliament on 22nd July resembled the court of the Kauravas with the Speaker playing Dritharashtra. Every individual in parliament on that day, notwithstanding the party to which he or she belonged, was some character in the shameful court and I was the nation.
When the Prime Minister …

I recently came across an interesting�article by Mark Fidelman provocatively titled, “Where Are India�s Innovative Companies, Products and Solutions?”
I would encourage all of you to have a look…Feldman has written persuasively about what ails innovation in India…but the real “action” is in the comments…one of which caught my eye and provided the inspiration for the title of this post. Bhamy V Shenoy commented�on May 15 (emphasis mine):
“…The biggest problem (in India) in my view is the non-functioning governance system because of (the) indifference (of) educated people who having been …

Many of you may�have�come across this information about “Ancient Indian Scientists” before. I received it in a chain email but I shall be most grateful if any reader(s) have links or references to the original source(s).�
There are many assertions and statements here�that have not been verified or explained (see e.g. the entry on Acharya Bharadwaj who is credited with advances in aviation technology*). We need to source and evidence�these it to make it more credible.
Some excerpts below (statements on which I need help are marked in italics):
***
ARYABHATT (476 CE), …

Ashutosh Sheshabalaya ,whom I quoted in my earlier post, has followed up with another brilliant piece of writing in The Globalist in which he talks about Nano and India’s impact on the larger global economy…
Some�excerpts:
…And yet, all that Western media manage to see is that �the planet is doomed� once millions of Indians and Chinese get their own cars � even though there is only one car for approximately every 1,000 Indians, while in the United States the ratio is three cars for every four people.
…Such ingrained Marie Antoinettesque assumptions …

Srinivas Bharadwaj, writing in rediff recently, made some great points about the “trashing” of Nano by some in the western media (”Why some US scribes slammed Tata Nano“, Jan 14 ‘08)
� Excerpts:
“…Tata Nano is the Model-T of India. It represents…a freedom no different from what Ford brought to the American consumer about a 100 years ago. And yet, it is already being challenged, not so much on price or on technology. It is considered a polluter, a source of global warming, in short, a threat to humanity.
Among its notable critics …

I recently stumbled on this news-item about the development of a new type of corrosion-resistant iron by Prof Balasubramaniam and one of his colleagues at IIT, Kanpur (emphasis mine):
…Indian metallurgists have developed a type of corrosion-resistant iron that construction engineers would love. And vital clues for it came for Delhi’s famous Iron Pillar that has been standing tall for over 1,600 years.
Developed by Ramamurthy Balasubramaniam and his former student Gadadhar Sahoo of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Kanpur, the iron contains phosphorus and shows remarkable resistance to corrosion, …

I recently stumbled across this article �Time Travel Machine Outlined��which provides food for thought for those who deride the stories in the puranas about “Vimanas” as mere myths.
The report talks about recent research at Haifa�s Israel Instt. of Technology that �could possibly enable distant future generations to travel into the past�
The hypothesis is – if space-time is bent far enough, so that time lines actually turn back on themselves to form a loop, such a manipulation could essentially get objects/people �back in time�.
Physicist Amos Ori whose findings are detailed in …

Thanks to Mohit who first alerted me to this site maintained by Varun Aggarwal on Sir J C Bose – the unsung hero of Indian Science.
Varun�s site details Sir J C Bose’s contribution to the field of physics and demonstrates beyond any doubt that he was the inventor of the radio which is mistakenly credited to Marconi (see also this wikipedia entry on Sir J C Bose).
The wikiepdia entry mentions, so spectacular were Bose’s achivements that Neville Francis Mott, Nobel Laureate in 1977 for his own contributions to solid-state electronics, …

Many of you must be familiar with how the Aryan Invasion Theory (AIT) is now all but dead
We probably don’t need another nail in its coffin but here is one that I came across late last year (buried deep under my “TO DO” list): “India Acquired Language, Not Genes, From West, Study Says”
What is really interesting about the article though is not its mention of AIT being disputed but the surreptitious (and easily overlooked) mention of “technology” amongst things that do not appear to be indigenous and may have come …

I came across this excellent, very powerful and well-researched article by �karigar�: Karnataki Karbon Nanotube Swords- forget S Indian Wootz!���
Please read in full and circulate widely. It is a shame that widespread ignorance still persists about our achievements in Sciences, Mathematics and various disciplines of technology.
While on the subject, please also have a look at one of my earlier articles: �Does no one remember the Hindu contribution to Mathematics?�
Some excerpts:
****************************�
Just got done reading the NY times article attached below. Apparently, “Cutting edge Technology” of Carbon Nanotubes & nanoscale …

From a recent issue of The Globalist

India’s Eau de Cologne and Europe’s Stench
By Ashutosh Sheshabalaya Friday, February 10, 2006

Europe ’s business and political establishment has been shocked by the unsolicited $24 billion bid by Indian-owned giant Mittal Steel for its European rival Arcelor. Ashutosh Sheshabalaya describes what he sees as the Europeans’ self-defeating protectionist instinct. For a proper response, he drafted an imaginary speech that Mr. Mittal should deliver to the shareholders of Arcelor.
Recently Arcelor’s Chief Executive Guy Doll� summed up the crux of the challenge: the European …