Unearthing of some objects, believed to be Stone Age tools, during excavation of a tank at a village nearby, has prompted the Visva Bharati University's archaeology department to seek assistance of the Archaeological Survey of India to unravel the mystery. "The scientific excavation is likely to throw new light on the possible existence of stone age people in this part of Bengal," sources in the university's archaeology department said. They said that the tools "bear similarity with those used by the Middle Paleolithic people some 40,000 years ago". Archaeology department head Subrata Chakraborty said that some moulded iron substances, circular in shape, were also found during excavation of the tank at Sekhampur village, near this sub-divisional town ofWest Bengal's Birbhum district.
All these
came to light last month when excavators, while carving out a tank from
a water pool, came across the artefacts "believed to be stone age
tools".
The artefacts consist of
borers, scrapers and tools, which, according to the Visva-Bharati
archaeologists, bear 'testimony' to the tools used in the Stone Age.
Chakraborty told PTI here
that his department had examined the tools, but could not come to any
conclusion about the period pending detailed inquiry by the ASI.
"After finding the
specimens collected during excavation, we believe these have the
features of Middle Paleolithic period," he said, suggesting wider
excavation of the tank.
Chakraborty said after he
had written a letter to the state's higher education minister
Satyasadhan Chakraborty, which was later forwarded to the chief
minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee, state government sent a team of
experts fromstate archaeological department to visit the site.
"However, report of that team is still awaited", he added.
Meanwhile, the district
administration has taken steps to ensure that there is no further
digging of the tank and, as such, the entire area has been cordoned off
to ward off any undesirable elements from nearing it.
ASI sources in
Kolkata were not available for comment on any new archaeological find
in Birbhum.Article Source
The oldest Isai Tamil inscription, dating back to the 2nd century, is no longer visible clearly. Soot, ash and stones have rendered illegible the inscription, which is in Tamil Brahmi, a script like Devanagari. It is in a cave, on the western end of the hillock in Arachalur.The inscriptions are tala notes (adavu) that a Bharatnatyam dancer dances to. It has five lines and as many rows, resembling a five-row - five-column matrix. It has been arranged in such a way that read either from left to right or top to bottom it reads the same. It is a palindrome as well.Close by is another inscription, which is also in Tamil Brahmi.It talks about the person who chiselled the above-mentioned lines. Most of it is damaged.
The third
inscription is equally bad.Tamil Brahmi Kal-vettukkal, a book on Tamil
Brahmi, published by the State Department of Archeology, acknowledges
the damage.
What is pitiful is that the inscriptions came to light only
about five decades ago, when Prof. S. Raju, an epigraphist of Erode,
discovered them in the early 1960s. He says they were carved by
wandering Jain monks, who came south during Chandra Gupta Maurya's time.
On the importance of the
inscription, Prof. Raju says it is the oldest in Isai Tamil. He adds
that apart from what the inscriptions convey, they hold additional
importance in that they are a very important link in the evolution of
Tamil vattaezhuthu (cursive letters).
Most of the inscriptions on
Malai Vannakkan Devan Sathan are damaged. That these inscriptions were
chiselled inside caves where the Jain monks used to rest has only
compounded the damage. For, using the perfect cover that the rock-roof
provides, locals indulge in merrymaking. Prof. Raju says he wants the
StateDepartment of Archaeology to immediately take up conservation
work.
Hundreds of Hindu villagers in eastern India have been ordered to hand over a rare turtle to officials but have refused to do so on the grounds that theybelieve the turtle to be the incarnation of Hindu deity Lord Jagannath."Hundreds of poor Hindu villagers in eastern India have refused to hand over a rare turtle to authorities, saying it is an incarnation of God, officials saidon Tuesday."
Authorities in a remote area of eastern India have appealed to the public not to conduct witch hunts following rumours that roving bands of witches had been killing people swept the region, media reports said Wednesday. Panic has spread through Chhattisgarh state following reports that witches were knocking on people’s doors and asking for onions and chapatti – local staple foods – and that anyone who handed out the food would die.Chhattisgarh, India’s most impoverished state, remains deeply traditional and superstitions and beliefs in the occult are rampant.
Last year at least 10 women were killed there on suspicion of being witches. “We have asked people not to believe in gossip mongering and try and think rationally,” Subodh Kumar Singh, a local government official told the Indian Express newspaper. “Awareness campaigns have also been launched asking people not to harass women by calling them ‘tonhi’ (witch),” Singh was quoted as saying. Many people, including localpoliticians, daubed prayers written in cow dung on their walls in the belief that it would ward off witches, the newspaper reported. The paper did not report any actual deaths attributed to the current rumours. Local officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
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Authorities in a remote area of eastern India have appealed to the public not to conduct witch hunts following rumours that roving bands of witches had been killing people swept the region, media reports said Wednesday. Panic has spread through Chhattisgarh state following reports that witches were knocking on people’s doors and asking for onions and chapatti – local staple foods – and that anyone who handed out the food would die.Chhattisgarh, India’s most impoverished state, remains deeply traditional and superstitions and beliefs in the occult are rampant. 
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