India’s next gift to the world could be Vedic mathematics

From next month, three Indian universities will begin to offer courses in Vedic calculations while home-learners can watch an entire television channel devoted to the subject on one of India’s digital networks.

 The rising popularity of Vedic maths is partly because of a renewed campaign by the nationalist prime minister, Narendra Modi, to lay India’s claim to the cornerstones of human knowledge. He marked India’s successful mission to Mars last year by claiming its ancient Vedic scientists had conceived of air travel thousands of years before the Wright Brothers made their first flight.

It was a reference to a disputed ’veda’ which described ancient air travel between Indian cities and to other planets. More recently Mr Modi said Lord Ganesha, the elephant-headed Hindu God, was evidence of early Indian knowledge of plastic surgery.

 Dina Nath Batra said Muslim invasions and British colonial rule were to blame. The ancient knowledge had been neglected “because we’ve been slaves of the Mohammedans and the British for 2,000 years. Nalanda [the ancient Indian university] and other places of wisdom were destroyed”, he said.

Professor H.S Mukunda, who led a 1974 study which debunked the claims of a ’Vedic’ aircraft, said ancient knowledge is only of value if it can be put to current use.

Prime Minister Modi