he ruins at Harappa were discovered in the early 19th Century by James Lewis (better known as Charles Masson), but the site was actually excavated by Sir Alexander Cunningham some fifty years later. After the ancient city of Mohenjodaro was discovered in the 1920s, archaeological excavations started in a systematic manner at several sites, including Harappa. These revealed clear evidence of planned communal living in cities dating from at least 2500 BC. Sir John Marshall described the new-found civilisation in these words: “Never for a moment it was imagined that five thousand years ago, before ever the Aryans were heard of, the Punjab and Sindh, if not other parts of subcontinent as well, were enjoying an advanced and singularly uniform civilisation of their own, closely akin, but in some respects superior, to that of contemporary Mesopotamia and Egypt.” Will Durant has written that before the discovery of this ancient civilisation, “historians supposed that history had begun with Greece. Europe gladly believed that India had been a hotbed of barbarism until the Aryan cousins of the European peoples had migrated from the shores of the Caspian to bring the arts and sciences to a savage and benighted peninsula.” To substantiate this point of view, Durant quotes Sir John Marshall: “These discoveries establish the existence in Sindh and the Punjab, during the fourth and third millennium BC, of a highly developed city life; and the presence, in many of the houses, of wells and bathrooms as well as an elaborate drainage-system, betoken a social condition of the citizens at least equal to that found in Sumer, and superior to that prevailing in contemporary Babylonia and Egypt”. Sir John was also very appreciative of the 5,000 years old jewellery discovered in the ruins and compared it with that sold at London’s prestigious shopping area, Bond Street.

It is now established that a group of people from Africa moved out of the continent and reached various areas of Asia around 75,000 years ago. Some of them made this region their home. It is believed that South Asia became the centre of modern human population 20,000 years ago. Around 7000 BC, a group of people from Zagros mountains (in modern-day Iran) reached Balochistan and introduced agriculture (like cultivation of wheat and barley) and the concept of domesticating animals. With the passage of time, the population grew and spread all over Sindh and the Punjab and eventually became the foundation of Harappan civilisation. The small settlements and villages grew and had to be fortified to stop invaders. With the emergence of towns, various trades such as masonry, woodwork, cloth making, etc, started becoming proper occupation. Trading with nearby areas in South Asia and faraway lands helped the Harappan people prosper materially as well as intellectually, as can be seen from town planning and architecture. The people of the Indus valley knew the use of metals and minerals such as gold, silver, copper, tin, lead and bronze. Among the food stuff, the presence of wheat, barely, fruits, meat and fish were attested. Cotton was grown, and weaving and dyeing were practiced. Quite interestingly, no central places of worship have been found. The culture was largely urban with well-planned streets and an impressive drainage and sewage system that reflects not only on the aesthetic sense of that time but also the effective governance in an era that many consider primitive. There is evidence of trade between Harappa and Mesopotamia in an age when means of transportation and communication were slow. The trading must have happened because of surplus production or value addition. The Harappan civilisation was perhaps at its peak around 3000 BC. This, however, did not last long and it ended mysteriously. It was perhaps destroyed by the invading Aryans from the steppes of Central Asia who had better military equipment and brought horses, iron and Indo-European languages with them. Alternatively, the Harappan civilisation may have been destroyed by natural disasters such as severe floods or drought. In an age when we are facing natural disasters because of climate change, and economic hardships because of negative balance of trade, there is much to learn from the failures and glories of the past civilisation. In his important book, Early Indians, Tony Joseph has written that “though science today has given us much clear understanding of human prehistory around the world, these findings are often not palatable to political ideologies that derive their strength from some form of ethnic or religious identity and like to believe that their nations are pure rather than mixed.” The reason for this politics is best explained by Eric Hobsbawm, who said: “Historians are to nationalism what poppy-growers are to heroin addicts: we supply the essential raw material for the market.” It is important to identify the divisive politics behind the us-and-them discourse. We must recognise that South Asian history is a history of migration from time immemorial, and there have been numerous peaceful periods along with warring times. The Harappan civilisation may not offer all answers to our modern-day problems, but by studying its formation, rise and fall, we can certainly draw some useful lessons for our future.

The writer is a social worker based in Tharparkar.

As an avid reader of history and literature, and a keen observer of socio-economic changes in the arid zones of Sindh, he has contributed to THAAP conferences in yesteryears