TRUTH IS BITTER AS WE SPEAK THE TRUTH

* Now, you have accepted the Lumbini Buddha birth place which is fine  but  there are numerous others out there in India who claim otherwise ignoring the archaeological evidence on the ground. Has the Archaeological Survey of India told them what you have accepted here ? And also we do not know whether all the schools and universities in India have checked with  Hari Parsad Sastri’s ‘History of India’ (in Bengali) and similar others.

* You also claim the Piprahawa find has been endorsed by most archaeologists. Have they really ? We do not know much about it. There is one  professor at Delhi University who has recently written: the discoveries of Piprahawa “should settle’ the long standing debate over Kapilvastu. Well may be and here too,  her usage of the phrase ‘should settle’ is something unclear however she has further written down ‘the Buddha relics have been identified  and Ganwaria represents Kapilvastu'. How have those relics been identified, we have no idea.

 By B. K. Rana

The Kapilvastu Forum has  come up again labeling us - The Himalayan Voice - as a ‘Bitter Voice” which actually we are not. We would rather say: should truth taste bitter, as the saying goes by, then we heartily accept this label also - in that we speak the truth.

As such the Kapilavastu Forum has provided seemingly some kind of 'compelling epigraphical evidence' on the Piprhawa Shrivastava find such as the inscription ( which virtually says - of the Sakyans or belonging to the Sakyans) it has also been equally successful, since it came into discussion with us - we believe, in offering an impression that academic discourse should start with or follow some ‘degrading remarks and terms’. Be it as it in their part. We have nothing more to say about it. We have also provided them with equally compelling inscription from our posting.

We tried to approach the Chief Minister’s Office in Uttar Pradesh but we could not find any easy access for contacting (email address) therefore we thought to post an open letter to the Governor. This was basically done in view of the growing anger and resentment from the people of both countries. We have not heard from the Governor's office but received some sketchy email messages from some other concerned official we think. And we do not believe writing an open letter that way to any person holding public office is a childish act. This kind of thinking itself is a childish thinking.

Now, the Kapilvastu Forum says it has studied “all the published materials on the archaeology of Nepali Terai” – sounds good to us. That is fine.

Our question here is: has this team ever had sometime to read this report  and this article ? We are at a loss to understand why it has become  another ‘beyond sense’ stuff from the part of Kapilvastu Forum ?

Secondly, we have also already outlined in our previous posts that we understand, there persist two different views in regard with the location of historical Kapilvastu. And therefore, we have not insisted that only Tilaurakot must be the real Kapilvastu. We have not said it at all. We have just said ‘let evidence speak’ from the ground. You may check our previous posts kindly.

We are also not siding with the western writers as you have mentioned. We also hold a belief that western writers endeavour to ‘demean or degrade’ our history and culture. ‘The Post-American World’, is such a book by a Harvard product, which has caused a huge uproar in Nepal and the Nepalese communities worldwide just recently and of which you should also have been well aware of,  we think. We hope you also understand that a Maoist lawmaker raised voice in the Nepalese parliament against this book’s saying that the Buddha was an Indian. So, issues have come up this way. You may feel pleased in finding an article we have posted onto our blog, found while web surfing by one Om Prakash who negates the colonial construct of Indian history and culture. For example we always say : a non-native always fails to understand what the native knows or understands of his language and culture.

Now, you have accepted the Lumbini Buddha birth place which is fine  but  there are numerous others out there in India who claim otherwise ignoring the archaeological evidence on the ground. Has the Archaeological Survey of India told them what you have accepted here ? And also we do not know whether all the schools and universities in India have checked with  Hari Parsad Sastri’s ‘History of India’ (in Bengali) and similar others.

You also claim the Piprahawa find has been endorsed by most archaeologists. Have they really ? We do not know much about it. There is one  professor at Delhi University who has recently written: the discoveries of Piprahawa “should settle’ the long standing debate over Kapilvastu. Well may be and here too,  her usage of the phrase ‘should settle’ is something unclear however she has further written down ‘the Buddha relics have been identified  and Ganwaria represents Kapilvastu'. How have those relics been identified, we have no idea.

Finally, we do not represent Nepalese Government. We are simply the Nepalese folks making some voices for some causes. What would the government of Nepal say about it we do not have anything to say right here. But we are the Nepalese people and we love our country as you do down there.