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Question -20
Different people propose different dates for Kali Yuga. What is the exact date of Kali Yuga?
Answer:
There is only one functional date of Kali yuga which is used for all purposes - civil, religious, legal and so on. This yuga is computational, starting from the exit of Krishna from his mortal coils. This year marks 3 events namely,
1. The exit of Krishna from the earth
2. Yudhishthira stepping down from the throne
3. Parikshit, the only surviving progeny of the Pandava-s becoming the king.
Kali Yuga's first king was Pariskhit.
All the above three events occurred in the year 3101 BCE, in the year Pramathi.
From then onwards the present time scale came to be known as Kali Maha yuga whose total duration is 4,32,000 years.
This date is computational, because it is determined by the conjunction of all the planets (except one of the nodes) at the beginning of sidereal Aries. It will take 4,32,000 years for the same planetary combination to repeat in the same point of Aries.
Due to its non-repeatability for such long scales, this scale is used as the Era of Time for all purposes. Inscriptions found anywhere in India are aligned to this date and not to any other date. For all economic transactions and religious activities, only this time scale is used.
For the question why there are other dates floating, the only answer is that they happened to be individual derivations as against the universally accepted date of 3101 BCE followed by kings and religious people.
That date was the day when Krishna left this world. It was the last day of Caitra, an Amavasya day which coincided with the Sun entering the sidereal sign of Mesha (Aswini star) when all the planets except Rahu congregated near Aswini. No other date except 3101 BCE match with these details. This date fulfils another stipulation that it must be 3139 years before the Shalivahana Shaka started.
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2 comments:
Namaskaram
Why is there two different traditions of month calculation in India?
One is Purnimant and the other one is Amavasyant. According to Geography what calender we should follow?
And which day should we celebrate as new year
- Kartik Prathama
- Chaitra Prathama or
- Vaishakh prathama
Namaskaram
There is only one method of calculation in the Yuga system, which by its very name (Yuga = join / pair) implies time starting from the conjunction of the Sun and the Moon, i.e., Amavasya. This was followed unanimously throughout India till Kali year 3044 (57 BCE). That was when the Vikrama Shaka started.
The demarcation of the Yugas was done at the beginning of Kali Yuga itself by the rishis, headed perhaps by Vyasa. Victory over Mlechhas was the criterion to identify the Shakakaraka who was to be known by the name Vikrama. When that date arrived, King Vikrama was found to have subdued mleccha rulers. When scholars of that time sat together to formalize the event, they found that the year did not have any special astronomical features. Perhaps they were under an impression that the tithi cycle or yoga/ karana cycle must begin together at the beginning of a shaka. Chaitardi of that year ensured only the beginning of month cycle.
On Karttika Pratipat in the same year, the tithi, yoga, karana cycles started simultaneously with the Sun in the star Chitra. Therefore, they opted for that date coming at the expiry of 3044 Kali Years. However on seeing the Chaitradi of the next year (56 BCE) at the expiry of 3045 Kali years starting with new cycles of all Panchanga features (weekday, star, tithi, yoga and karana), the beginning of the Vikrama Shaka was adjusted to 56 BCE from Chaitra. Please read my article here. In the later part of the article I have written about this confusion in Vikrama Shaka https://jayasreesaranathan.blogspot.com/2021/04/identity-and-genetic-trail-of-saka.html
By then people have started following the Kartikadi of the previous year. Thus two variants - year starting from Kartik Prathama 56 BCE and Chaitra Prathama of 57 BCE - is noticed in the inscriptions of those places that followed Vikrama Shaka.
The Vikrama Shaka should be valid for only 135 years as per the Yuga concept, after which Shalivahana shaka should begin (78 CE). And this did happen at the designated year by the scholars of that time who made Gautamiputra Shatakarni as the Shakakaraka. Shalivahana is a kind of generic name coined by the rishis at the beginning of Kali Yuga. Not necessary that a person by name Shalivahava was to be born. The king who defeated Mlechas in the designated Kali year 3139 (78 CE) was identified as the Shakakaraka, Shalivahana. By this time, people stopped bothering about the cycle beginnings, as it is impossible to occur.
Shalivahana Shaka was started in Chaitradi Prathama. Was followed in most of South India and some places of North India. Some places continued to follow Vikrama Shaka while they should not have. The rishis who designed the Kali Yuga classification expected the whole of Bharat to follow Shalivahana shakha after 3139 Kali years. Due to the presence of various kingdoms with no or least interaction with others, the unanimity was not achieved. Atleast now, with the entire Bharat existing as a single unit, the Shalivahana shaka must be used throughout.
Shalivahana shaka started on Chaitradi only. Vaishaka Prathama is indeed the 1st day of Kali Yuga when the Sun was in Mesha. Mesha sankramana of the sun marked the Kali Yuga beginning. So all these three are in use in different places of India.
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