Jayasree Saranathan

Appendix I of my book

MYTH OF 'THE EPOCH OF ARUNDHATI' OF NILESH NILKANTH OAK

Reproducing here the Appendix I of my book critiquing the date of Mahabharata by Mr Nilesh Oak. This is already available in academia (Here). Since it requires sign up in academia, I am giving the entire version here with additions wherever needed from a previous chapter of the book.

In this era of all-round degradation, the Itihasas also are not spared. Treated on par with Vedic rishis and given arghya in Upakarma as ‘Itihasam tarpayami’ Itihasas are being held sacred by many practicing Hindus. Unfortunately in tune with the decadence of Time, they are now being rendered as ‘theory’ and mutilated at will in the name of research.

The biggest threat comes from the destabilising effect of Mr Nilesh Oak’s Ramayana and Mahabharata dates on the reclamation of the Indic past from AIT-ians, for, the moment his ‘theories’ gain wider acceptance among Indians, the pro-AIT-ians will axe us with scientific facts, on how Oak's Ramayana could not have taken place when Ice Age was still running with most of North India under terrible cold and how Oak’s Mahabharata date cannot be based on his A-V theory since science has established them to be on gravitational coupling of a cycle of 7,50,000 years! Added to this are the scientific rules and calculation on how to deduce that a star went ahead of the other disproving Mr Oak’s “A-V Theory”. (See Appendix II of my book). The pro-AIT-ians are getting an easy tool in Oak’s ‘dates’ to denounce Indians as having no scientific acumen, living in a mythical world and reject Rama and Krishna as myths.

Now with the publication of my research on Siddhantic version of precession in tune with the emerging trends in science that would bring out a change in the simulator settings by which Mr Nilesh Oak’s “Simulator Nyaya” is going to be swept out, I see signs of him coming up with manipulation aka mutilation of Siddhantas, though he cannot afford to touch science which has started indicating that the earth doesn’t precess like a spinning top or a gyroscope.

Already manipulation had started in "daily calendar" in which Oak had taken up the avatar of Sages in ushering in "Mahabharat Samvat". Funny part is the inclusion of Shalivahana year that is sub period of traditional Kali Yuga which he denounces!

In the coming days he can be expected to manipulate Indic texts at will in two areas:

1. Changing the Siddhantic concept of 7200 year cycle of precession to align it with the current version of 24,000 to 26,000 year cycle of precession of the western astronomy simulators.

2. Changing the Yuga concept so that Krishna could be made to die 2000 years before his actual date of exit, by which he can claim that Kali Yuga started 7000 years ago, i.e. 35 years after his date of Mahabharata war.

Scary, but Dharma Devata offers a ray of Hope. You know why?

So what is pathologically wrong with Nilesh Oak’s research?

People who decide to do research would first acquire the domain knowledge of the subject of research. Here the domain knowledge is the knowledge of stars and planets and how they were studied by the ancient Indic society. What did Nilesh Oak do? He kept checking A-V for years in simulator after simulator to somehow get a glimpse of – however unscientific it may be – Arundhati ahead of Vasishtha. He decided to know about stars and planets only after he gets his A-V obsession somehow produced in the simulator. Read this in his own words from his book.

The now expected manipulations on precession and Yuga are also of the same category of picking out what suits his ‘research’ and not the logical outcome of a research with domain knowledge.

With this introduction you may proceed to read how he had manipulated the verses and astronomy features to suit his ‘Theory’.

From my book:-

Very often one finds Nilesh Nilkanth Oak claiming in public platforms and social media that he has successfully corroborated 300+ astronomy references of Mahabharata for his date of Mahabharata War in the year 5561 BCE. Here I am giving the true picture of the nature of his claim. Even before we venture to check his corroborations, the reader must be informed that Nilesh Nilkanth Oak had not even corroborated the major highlights of Mahabharata – despite claiming the text to be factual. In the 9^th chapter of his book, he has given “six specific observations of Mahabharata and one traditional belief (Kali Yuga and the Mahabharata War) conflicting” with his theory and / or proposed time line.^{^[1]}

Mahabharata observation	Nilesh Oak	Jayasree Saranathan
Balarama Tirtha Yatra starting on Pushya and ending on Shravana after 42 days	Not corroborated	Corroborated
Late Moonrise on 14^th day of War	Not corroborated	Corroborated
Bhishma passing away on Magha Shuddha Ashtami after 58 days with pain of arrows	Not corroborated	Corroborated
Traditional date of Kali Yuga	Not corroborated	Corroborated
Bhishma compared with Full moon on 1^st day of war	Tried unsuccessfully to corroborate	Analogy, so didn’t attempt to corroborate
Analogy of solar eclipse on 18^th day of war	Tried unsuccessfully to corroborate	Analogy, so didn’t attempt to corroborate
Krishna left for peace mission at the end of Sharad season.	Not corroborated	Corroborated

The above table raises a question how Nilesh Oak can claim success in his research when five major events of Mahabharata were not corroborated by him for his timeline. While we appreciate his openness in accepting that he had not corroborated these events, we are constrained to express our doubts about his integrity and proficiency in the text for all the other ‘corroborations’ he had done in his book. Let me first highlight the 7^th chapter of his book titled “The planets were aligned.” There are 18 planetary observations he has dealt with in this chapter by naming them as experiments numbered form 10 to 27. Let me show that all of them are manipulated to fit-in with his date.

(1) Experiment No 10: “Jupiter and Saturn near Vishakha”.^{^[2]} (Mahabharata reference No 6 in his book)

“grahau tāmrāruṇa śikhau prajvalantāv iva sthitau
saptarṣīṇām udārāṇāṃ samavacchādya vai prabhām”
saṃvatsarasthāyinau ca grahau prajvalitāv ubhau
viśākhayoḥ samīpasthau bṛhaspatiśanaiścarau”^{^[3]}

He has taken the last line of this verse and attempted to locate Jupiter and Saturn in the Voyager Simulator by means of DVA (Direct Visual Astronomy which “involves simulating movement of the object of interest, as seen from a specific location on the earth”)^{^[4]} When he checked for the 1^st day of the war (when this observation was purported to be made) “Jupiter stayed in the region of Mula- UttraAshada, Saturn stayed in the region of Chitra – Uttara Phalguni”. But he “treated this as a satisfactory corroboration of this Mahabharata observation”. How?

He reasons out that Jupiter and Saturn were equi-distant from Vishakha, in nakshatra space, east and west of Vishakha respectively!! Jupiter was near Mula and Saturn was near Hasta, each at a distance of more than 2 nakshatra space (>27˚) from Vishakha!

The questions that arise are

· What is the extent of ‘sameepa’ in Vyasa’s astronomy in this verse? Without defining this how could a scientific researcher proceed to locate a planet in ‘sameepa’ (near) of some star?

· If Jupiter was in Mula, Vyasa could have written that it was in Mula. Why should he write that it was nearing Vishakha which is more than 2 nakshatras away?

· Similarly why should Vyasa say that Saturn was nearing Vishakha while it was 2 stars away from Vishakha?

But Nilesh Nilkanth Oak finds the position of Jupiter and Saturn a corroboration of Vyasa’s observation that they were near Vishakha!! Anyway he has safely written earlier that the “Determination of the Nakshatra of any given day based on visual observation can lead to an error of +/-1day”^{^[5]} This experiment shows more than 2 nakshatras in a given day. It doesn’t matter as it can be added in the next edition of his book.

According to him Experiment 10 is successful corroboration of planetary alignment on his date of Mahabharata – notwithstanding the fact that Jupiter can never come near Vishakha with Sun in Jyeshtha (as it entails vakri motion) and it will take 11 to 12 years for Jupiter to come near Vishakha. In the case of Saturn, it will take more than one and a half years to come near Vishakha!

This being the ‘scientific’ nature of corroborating the verse, whom does he want to satisfy by making this experiment? For him “this was merely a verification of Vartak’s explanation”. So the reader can rest assured he had not proved Vyasa’s verse!

(2) Experiment number 11: “Saturn near Bhaga” (Mahabharata reference No 10 in his book).

The verse runs as follows:

bhāgyaṃ nakṣatram ākramya sūryaputreṇa pīḍyate^{^[6]}

Nilesh Oak writes,

“Voyager simulation shows that Saturn is near Bhaga (Uttara Phalguni) for a period of more than two years leading to the first day of Mahabharata War, when it began approaching Chitra.”^{^[7]}

What is wrong with this?

The issues are:

· Nilesh Oak does not define the word ‘Pidyate’ in the verse. It is too essential to know the meaning as it refers to Saturn in third case (Instrumental case - Surya putrena). The dictionary meaning of ‘Pidyate’ is hurt or be pressed or afflicted. So ‘Surya putrena Pidyate’ refers to an affliction or harm caused by Saturn (son of Surya). How could ‘Pidyate’ be taken to mean “near”? Oak must explain why he interprets ‘Pidyate’ as ‘near’.

· Nilesh Oak has aligned Bhaga with Uttara Phalguni. But Bhaga is the presiding deity of Purva Phalguni. For Uttara Phalguni the deity is Aryama. The Rig and Yajur Vedanga Jyothishas give the list of the deities for stars in the sequence starting from Krittika. Per that Bhaga was the presiding deity of Purva phalguni and Aryama was for Uttara Phalguni. Earlier we proved in the context of the 5-year Yuga that the Vedanga Jyothisha was in vogue in Mahabharata times. Therefore a reference to Bhaga must align it with Purva Phalguni and not Uttara Phalguni.

· Long after he published his book, Oak makes a mention of the reversal of the two deities Bhaga and Aryama for the two Phalguni stars in a different context in his blog written on October 2016,[8] quoting Taittriya Samhita and Taittriya Brahmana. But there is no discussion in his book or anywhere else on the exact stellar ruler ship followed at the time of Mahabharata war.

· Without giving any justification or explanation for which of the deities ruled the two stars, he had written Bhaga and Aryama for both the phalguni stars in Table 3 on stars and nakshatra devatas for the year 5561 BC. Since the text talks about “Bhagyam nakshatram”, the star ruled by Bhaga assumes significance.

· Nilesh Oak should have proved which of the two Phalguni stars were ruled by Bhaga in Mahabharata astronomy. In the absence of that he stands to be accused of picking up what suits him with his Simulator Nyaya.

· Nilesh Oak says that simulation shows Saturn near Uttara Phalguni for 2 years (to justify the reference to Bhagyam nakshatram) and continues to say that Saturn began approaching Chitra on the first day of his date of Mahabharata war! This means Saturn was near or at the star Chitra on his date which is a clear contradiction to Vyasa’s observation of Bhagyam nakshatram.

· Even if we assume that Saturn was near Uttara Phalguni as he initially claims from the simulator, Saturn has to cross Hasta before reaching Chitra. This means it will take nearly a year for Saturn to reach Chitra – the position on the day of Oak’s date of Mahabharata war – from Uttara Phalguni. Then how could he claim that he has successfully corroborated Vyasa’s verse on Saturn’s position near Bhaga?

· From Bhaga (lord of Purva Phalguni in 5 year Yuga calendar) it will take not less than 2 years to reach Chitra – on the first day of Mahabharata war (Oak’s date). This means from Vyasa’s observation to Oak’s date of Mahabharata war, Saturn needs 2 full years to fill the gap. But in Nilesh Oak’s ‘scientific’ research this is possible!

(3) Experiment number 12: “Mercury travelling through all nakshatras”.^{^[9]} (Mahabharata reference No 15 in his book)

The verse says,

triṣu pūrveṣu sarveṣu nakṣatreṣu viśāṃ pate
budhaḥ saṃpatate 'bhīkṣṇaṃ janayan sumahad bhayam^{^[10]}

Nilesh Oak interprets this verse as a “trivially true observation” of Mercury travelling through all the nakshatras over a period of one year and therefore “no verification is required.” So “The observation certainly corroborates my conjecture for the time interval over which astronomy observations were made during and after the Mahabharata War,” says Nilesh Oak.

The issues are:

· Why should Vyasa single out Mercury as travelling through all stars when all planets travel through all nakshatras?

· There is another expression “budhaḥ saṃpatate” describing a collision or intersection at the time of Mahabharata war. Without deducing what ‘sampatate’ means how can a ‘scientific researcher’ conduct his experiment and claim success?

· The success claimed by Oak is such that this verse corroborates his conjecture that the astronomy observations given by Vyasa were actually made during, before and after the war. This is based on the above verse on Mercury of travelling through all nakshatras. If this can be claimed as corroboration, anyone can quote a year XXXX and say the planets travelled through all the nakshatras and therefore his / her conjecture is corroborated well!

· This corroboration is made in violation of the obvious fact that Vyasa made this observation only before or on the first day of the war and certainly not after the war. Perhaps Nilesh Oak thinks his readers are dullards.

(4) Experiment numbered 13: Vakri’ motion of Mars.^{^[11]} (Mahabharata reference No: 11, 13, 14 in his book)

In the previous instances quoted on the manipulations done by Nilesh Oak to prove his date, we faulted him for neglecting to define the terms in the verses. Here in this experiment he attempts to define the term ‘Vakri’ in the verses on Mars. It was well established earlier how Nilesh Oak demonstrated his utter lack of understanding of ‘Vakri’. In this experiment he describes how he derived the meaning of the term Vakri through DVA – Direct Visual Astronomy of the Simulator.

Nilesh Oak hopes to clinch something big in his discovery of the meaning of Vakri, comparable with Kepler. He says,^{^[12]}

“There is indeed something intriguing about Mars. Small discrepancy (between prediction and actual observation) in the measurement of Mars led Kepler to his marvellous theory of elliptical orbits of planets. Intriguing descriptions of Mars in the Mahabharata text and my explanation provide high degree of corroboration to the proposed year of 5561 B.C.”

Oak has indeed made a break-through invention of Mars spending nearly 6 months in retrogression in Chitra and Swati before it turned forward.^{^[13]} This is against the current scientific knowledge of Mars in retrogression that is possible for only 80 days at a stretch. All glory to Voyager simulator that enabled him to see this through DVA.

· Nilesh Oak can notify the developers of Voyager Simulator of this discovery to take his name forward for recognition.

· Oak can also notify them of his innovative ways of deriving meaning for a Sanskrit word like ‘vakri’ and the English word ‘retrogression’ by means of DVA so that they can use his name and innovation as publicity material to promote their product.

· But Nilesh Oak must be careful not to take his discovery and innovation to the notice of an astronomer to avoid getting his book tossed into a dustbin. No astronomer would accept his explanation without first establishing them conceptually and mathematically.

Sadly Nilesh Oak’s book is a series of ideas never established conceptually or mathematically but ‘seen’ and ‘proven’ in the DVA of the Voyager Simulator.

(5) Experiment No 14: “Jupiter going vakri near Shravana”^{^[14]} (Mahabharata reference no 11 in his book)

Once having convinced himself about the meaning of vakri in Mahabharata text through his own derivation using the simulator, Nilesh Oak confidently describes the verse “maghāsv aṅgārako vakraḥ śravaṇe ca bṛhaspatiḥ” as referring to the vakri motion of Mars and Jupiter. Having ‘established’ the vakri motion of Mars in the previous experiment, he is concentrating on Jupiter’s vakri motion in this experiment. He says, “DVA simulation of Jupiter corroborated ‘vakri’ motion of Jupiter as it travelled obliquely across the ecliptic near Shravana.”

Crossing the ecliptic obliquely is Oak’s definition for ‘vakri’ motion. He looked for such motion in the simulator and created Figure 9 and Table 7 to give additional details to prove this.

This figure is fine but where is Sun’s position in this figure? Any vakri motion is caused when the superior planet is away from the Sun. For Jupiter, vakri motion starts when it reaches 245˚ from the Sun and ends that motion on reaching 115˚ from the Sun.

Computing the distance on the first day of the War, the gap between Jupiter in Shravana (according to Nilesh Oak) and Sun in Jyeshtha (assuming it to be in the last degree of Jyeshtha) was anywhere between 41˚to 54˚ only and not sufficient enough to make Jupiter appear to be in vakri for an observer on the earth.

· This means that Jupiter was not in Vakri motion at Shravana when the Sun was in Jyeshtha in the 1^st day of the War in Nilesh Oak’s timeline.

· If Vyasa had said that Jupiter was in vakri at Shravana on that day, then it means that Nilesh Oak’s date of Mahabharata is wrong.

Any astronomy simulator would show vakri movement of a planet. But in the absence of that for Jupiter for his date, Nilesh Oak had simply manipulated the entire concept of vakri which I exposed in the 4^th chapter of this book.

[From 4^th chapter of the book:

Oak’s revolutionary discovery of the meaning of ‘Vakri’ motion

‘Vakri’ is a word that often troubles this Mahabharata researcher. Since he never thought that learning astrology terms would help in understanding the astronomy terms of Mahabharata, we are entertained with a new a discovery of the definition of Vakri, through ‘Voyager- Simulation Nyaya’. He gives the list of findings on Vakri he made through this Nyaya in the 4^th chapter on Mahabharata astronomy^{^[15]}, of which his discovery that ‘all planets appear much brighter than their usual magnitude during their retrograde motion” is the first of its kind that no scientist had ever proposed or dared to propose.

Vakri is generally translated as ‘retrograde’ motion. But Oak found a difference between Vakri and retrogression through the Voyager- Simulation Nyaya and proposes that the Mahabharata uses the two terms in different meanings. After working on the vakri of different planets with the aid of this Nyaya, he came to the conclusion that “Mahabharata astronomers referred to oblique crossing of the ecliptic by a planet as ‘vakri’ motion while the true retrograde motion of a planet was described as being steady (dhruva or sthayi), or travelling in reverse (apasavya) direction.”^{^[16]}

For a reader confused with this distinction between vakri and retrograde motion, a solution is available in his blog as follows: ^{^[17]}

Anticipating what the reader would ask on reading this, he continues to write as follows in the same blog post.

He differentiates the two movements – Vakri and retrograde - of which the definition of the latter continues to elude him. As one who has confessed in the very beginning of his book that his approach is ‘piecemeal’^{^[18]} he has solved the problem of Vakri for now and postponed to a future research the concept of ‘retrograde motion’ given in Mahabharata.

With this piecemeal discovery Nilesh Oak goes on to locate the vakri planet and the retrograde planet in the simulator and claims victory that he had correctly found out the date of that observation.

Ends the quote from the 4^th chapter]

The best to way to falsify Oak’s definition of vakri (that it refers to crossing the ecliptic) is to present the declination graph of planets. The following figure is the declination graph for April 2019^{^[19]} that shows two planets Mercury and Venus crossing the ecliptic on 21^st and 23^rd April respectively from south to north. But no vakri or retrograde motion is detected along with or after this crossing.

Common sense dictates that a researcher cross-checks these positions with testable periods as done above. This is too much for the asking as far as Nilesh Nilkanth Oak is concerned. He lives in his own world of ‘scientific research’.

(6) Experiment No 15: “Venus near Purva Bhadrapada.^{^[20]} (Mahabharata reference No 18 in his book)

The next experiment numbered 15 can be clubbed with Experiment No 21 as they are about the location of Venus on the 1^st and 18^th day of the war respectively. The two locations deduced by Nilesh Oak using DVA and Voyager simulation stands out as a classic example of misuse and manipulation of the so-called Falsification theory of Popper besides getting stamped as the “Mother of all Manipulations”

Let us see the first location given in experiment 15. In this, Oak attempts to corroborate the location of Venus near Purva Bhadrapada in Voyager Simulator. The following verse of Mahabharata is the basis for this derivation.^{^[21]}

śukraḥ proṣṭhapade pūrve samāruhya viśāṃ pate
uttare tu parikramya sahitaḥ pratyudīkṣate

Nilesh Oak declares, “There was no need to guess through, not when you have DVA and Voyager 4.5.”

He simulated the journey of Venus beginning the 1^st of the War and found that Venus turned north and did a circular journey (parikrama) around Neptune near Purva Bhadrapada – Neptune, the planet never even once recognised in any literature of India.

“The simulator corroborated Venus turning north as if to do parikrama (around Neptune) near Purva Bhadrapada.” Remember this is on the 1^st day of the War noticed in the simulator.

In 21^st experiment Nilesh Oak wants to corroborate another verse (Reference no 17 in his book) that says that Mars, Venus and Mercury appeared behind the Pandavas on the 18^th day.^{^[22]} Oak finds that “Voyager simulation confirmed positions of these planets in the western part of the sky after sunset.”

From the simulator Oak gives the separation angle of Venus from the Sun as 43.1˚.

Organising the two positions at 1^st and 18^th day of the War:

1^st day position of Venus = Venus was near Purva Bhadrapada. Purva Bhadrapada starts from 20 degrees of Aquarius. Sun was in Jyeshtha in Scorpio on the first day of the War. Assuming that the Sun was at the last degree of Jyeshtha on the 1^st day of the War, Venus at Purva Bhadrapada can be located at more than 81˚ from the Sun. This is an IMPOSSIBLE location because Venus cannot be sighted 47 degrees away from the Sun – forward or backward. Venus is an inner planet and can be seen only within 3 signs (at the most) of the sun. When the Sun is in Scorpio, Venus cannot be in Pisces or even Aquarius where Purva Bhadrapada is located.

Only a person who does not have any basic knowledge about planetary position from the sun in geo-centric view will be able to go ahead ‘deducing’ the location as Oak has done.

18^th day position of Venus = Venus was sighted in the western sky after sunset at a distance of 43.1˚ from the Sun. This was also “confirmed” from Voyager simulator.

The issue is within a matter of 18 days Venus has travelled backwards from Purva Bhadrapada at more than 81˚ away from the sun to its east to 43.1˚ to the west of the Sun. This means covering a distance of 124.1˚ in 18 days!!! This is also an IMPOSSIBLE situation.

Who has gone wrong?

· Was Vyasa wrong?

· Was Voyager wrong?

· Was Nilesh Oak wrong?

Vyasa could not have been wrong. He had given an observation using the tradition and terminology of his times and may not have meant that Venus was near Purva Bhadrapada on the 1^st day of the War (also explained in the 12^th chapter of this book).

But Nilesh Oak went ahead with that and even found it in the simulation! How could the simulator give a wrong reading?

There can be only one deduction from this: Nilesh Oak had seen Venus in the simulator on some day when it was actually transiting that location but linked it with the 1^st day of the war! All for corroborating his date of Mahabharata War!

The same simulator gives the location of Venus on the 18^th day at a distance reasonably within limits. But between the two dates, the ‘corroboration’ done by Oak to align the position of Venus with his date of Mahabharata smacks of all the following:

· Hypocrisy

· Lack of integrity in research

· Lack of astronomy knowledge

· Lack of understanding of how to use the simulator

· Lack of knowledge that scientific research calls for exactness and not approximations and manipulations.

All these put together is the negative outcome of what Popper’s theory of Falsificationist criteria does to scientific spirit. Nilesh Nilkanth Oak enters the pages of history as a classic example of misuse of Falsificationist methodology.

(7) Experiment No 16: “Tivra or Tikshna, Planet or nakshatra near Krittika” ^{^[23]} (Mahabharata reference No 21 in his book)

The reference verse is from Bhishma parva.

kṛttikāsu grahas tīvro nakṣatre prathame jvalan
vapūṃṣy apaharan bhāsā dhūmaketur iva sthitaḥ^{^[24]}

Nilesh Oak doesn’t know what Tivro nakshatra means in this verse. He doesn’t care to search for the true meaning from traditional texts. His “task was then simply to re-confirm what Vartak has already figured out. Pluto is seen between Rohini and Krittika, rather closer to Rohini on the first day of War. This is sufficient corroboration of this Mahabharata observation.”

The verse refers to Tivro Nakshatra, but Oak identifies it as Pluto! It is because he is only re-confirming Vartak’s observation that Nakshatra could mean ‘extremely slow moving planet’ (Pluto). Pluto is not even a planet in current standards, but Oak thinks Vyasa had meant that in his observation! “This observation demands telescopic ability, i.e. access to such instruments in Mahabharata times. This ability is also required to explain few other Mahabharata observations.” By saying this Oak keeps the door open for further manipulation – with the sole aim of corroborating his date of Mahabharata War.

(8) Experiment number 17: “The SUN and the Moon together afflicting Rohini”^{^[25]} (Mahabharata reference no 26 and also 8, 9, 12 in his book)

In this experiment Nilesh Oak claims to explain 4 Mahabharata references (numbered 8, 9, 12, 26) – all pointing to a term Pidayate. This terms means afflicting – a case of one planet afflicting another or a planet afflicting a star. This term is used in astrology but scientific minded Oak does not accept astrology as an empirical science. With the simulator at hand he ‘discovers’ the meaning of pidayate as a situation of one planet rising and another setting simultaneously by which the rays of one afflicts the other. He uses this conjecture to describe the Sun and the Moon on the Amawasya day setting on the west while Rohini was rising on the east.

He extends this rationale to three other Mahabharata references too (8, 9 and 12) and claims that his conjecture allowed him to explain those references too. The fact is he did not explain those verses with the meaning he deduced from the simulator. Nor do those verses give any description of the entities mentioned in those verses to be in opposite ends (180˚) as with Sun and Moon opposite to Rohini.

· How then could one interpret that those verses also refer to the rays of one fall on the other?

· Does it sound logical that only the entities at two ends of the sky afflict the other (or each other)?

· Why not the planets at any location send their rays on others in any other part of the sky?

· Should a scientific minded Oak propose this kind of theory of rays of one afflicting the other for a word “Pidyate”?

· By offering such an explanation, is he not acceding to astrology?

(9) Experiment No 18: “Jupiter, similar to the Sun and the Moon, afflicting Rohini after the sunset on the 17^th day of War”.^{^[26]} (Mahabharata reference No 12 in his book)

This again is a reference to ‘Pidayate’. This experiment is aimed at explaining the verse “Brhaspati rohinim samprapidaya”.^{^[27]} The verse refers to Jupiter afflicting Rohini. The verse is being told on the 17^th day of the war. The simulator based meaning of ‘Pidyate’ deduced by Oak is such that the one afflicting must be on one side of the horizon while the afflicted one must be in the opposite horizon. That is, if one is in the western horizon, the other must be in the eastern horizon. They must be at a distance of 180˚.

The previous experiment showed that Rohini was in the eastern horizon when it was afflicted by the Sun and the Moon that were setting in the western horizon. But on the 17^th day, Jupiter comes in the picture as one afflicting Rohini. Oak conjectures that Jupiter must be in the western horizon to make this affliction on Rohini. The Voyager simulator confirms the presence of Jupiter in the western sky in the same position occupied by the Sun and the Moon in the 1^st day. So the ‘pidayate’ happens on Rohini.

Now the questions in our mind are

· We found the location of Jupiter in experiment numbered 14 at Shravana on the 1^st day of the war. This was to the east of the Sun at a distance of 41˚ to 54˚. In 17 days, how far Jupiter had moved to be at the same location of Sun on the 1^st day?

· Each day the point of horizon rises early by 1˚ approximately (for 360˚ to be covered in a year) and so in 17 days the part of the sky where Jupiter is located rises 17˚ earlier. In the same period the Sun had progressed by 17˚ resulting in reduction in the gap between the Sun and Jupiter. On the 17^th day Jupiter would be seen at a distance of 24˚to 37 ˚ from the Sun. This is not the exact location of the Sun on the 1^st day of the war.

· From Jupiter at 24˚to 37˚ range from the Sun, Rohini will be anywhere between 107˚ to 130˚ distance from Jupiter. This is not exact 180˚ gap or anywhere close to it to enable Jupiter to afflict Rohini by its rays by “pidayate.”

· But Oak claims that the simulator shows Jupiter in the western horizon. This is possible at more than 2 hours after sunset and definitely not at the time of sun set when the Sun was afflicting Rohini on the 1^st day of the War.

· At a distance of minimum 50˚ short of 180˚ Oak uses the description of Pidyate which he originally theorised for 180˚ distance. He wants us to accept such descriptions as scientific!

· If affliction is what happens at 180˚, he cannot claim it to happen at 130˚. If it happens so, then his explanation for pidayate is not correct.

(10) Experiment No 19: “Saturn afflicts Rohini”.^{^[28]} (Mahabharata reference No 8, 9 in his book)

Affliction is “Pīdana” and so there is no problem in explaining away this reference in the same lines that Nilesh Oak explained for the Sun and the moon afflicting Rohini, and Jupiter afflicting Rohini. Oak does concede that having explained the observation of affliction of Rohini in previous experiments, “it is easy to understand Mahabharata observation(s) of Saturn.”

Rohini was in the western horizon and “Saturn being the only other planet in the eastern part of the sky”, “this observation is then described as Saturn afflicting Rohini,” so concludes Nilesh Oak.^{^[29]}

However he is tempted to use other terms known to him such “Rohini Shakat Bheda”. The underlying feature of his research is such that one must get together the terms known to oneself and say that the observations are corroborated.

(11) Experiment No 20: “Unusual (Tiryak) rising of Mercury on the 17^th day of the War (after the sunset)^{^[30]} (Mahabharata reference No 16 in his book)

Nilesh Oak has picked out a verse expressed at the fall of Karna that is analogous to mourning the death of Karna. In a bid to express that all animate and inanimate, terrestrial and celestial beings were sad, the appearance of Mercury was also quoted in that context. The rivers had stood still. The sun had become pale and Mercury appeared to move in ‘tiryak’ way! Here Tiryak means slanting or horizontal and not unusual that Oak thinks. As if to bow before the fallen Karna, Mercury had moved obliquely or in slanting angle. This is what the verse says.

This verse does not qualify to be a testable astronomy observation, for Mercury is always seen close to the sun within 28 degrees on either side of the sun for the observer on earth. Take any year in the simulator; one can spot Mercury crossing the sun from one side or another in horizontal or slanting angle or just moving in the sky to the east or west of the Sun. This is not unique to Nilesh Oak’s date of Mahabharata or any other date. Just to count his numbers corroborated, Nilesh Oak has taken this regular feature of Mercury.

(12) Experiment No 21: “Mars, Venus & Mercury in the western sky after sunset, 18^th day of the war”^{^[31]} (Mahabharata reference No 17 in his book)

After locating Venus in Purva Bhadrapada (experiment 15) Nilesh Oak is able to see it 124 degrees backward within 18 days – an impossible situation. Mars located closely behind the Sun in this reference was aligned with Abhijit on the first day of the war according to his blog-entry. Abhijit is at Capricorn but in this experiment he sees Mars after sunset on the 18^th day of the war in the western sky at 46.6˚ from the sun. This super-fast movement by these planets have been objectively tested, claims Nilesh Oak, the master manipulator.

From his blog-post, dated 20^th April 2019^{^[32]}

(13) Experiment No 22: “Seven planets seen near the Sun”^{^[33]} (Mahabharata reference No 24 in his book)

This phoney nature of the corroboration done by Nilesh Oak was already explained in the 4th chapter. To re-cap it, the verse doesn’t say that the planets were near. Nilesh Oak ‘corroborates’ seven planets by including Neptune and Uranus. I have established the import of this verse in the 12th chapter.

[From 4^th chapter:-

The next reference on Sapta Graha is Reference No 24. The verse says,^{^[34]}

maghā viṣayagaḥ somas tad dinaṃ pratyapadyata
dīpyamānāś ca saṃpetur divi sapta mahāgrahāḥ

Nilesh Oak interprets this verse as “seven planets were seen near the Sun”.^{^[35]} Where does this verse say that seven planets were “NEAR” the Sun? Ganguli does not say that seven planets were ‘near’ the sun. Ganguli translates this verse as “On that day on which the battle commenced Soma approached the region of Pitris. The seven large planets, as they appeared in the firmament, all looked blazing like fire.”^{^[36]}.

Without establishing that the verse refers to seven planets near the Sun, Nilesh Oak goes on to include outer planets in the list of seven that were seen from east to west in the sky.

End of the excerpt from 4^th chapter]

(14) Experiment No 23: “Seven planets attacking the moon”^{^[37]} (Mahabharata reference No 23 in his book.

This is an analogy to “describe the war scene of seven Kaurava brothers attacking Bhima”, admits Oak. Only Nilesh Oak has the temerity to test analogies in astronomy simulator and claim that he has successfully corroborated astronomy references of Mahabharata. And the seven planets include Uranus, Neptune and Pluto!!

(15) Experiment No 24: “Seven planets going away from the Sun.”^{^[38]} (Mahabharata reference No 25 in his book)

Already I exposed the bogus nature of the explanation by Nilesh Oak for this verse in the 4^th chapter. I am reproducing here to remind the readers the nature of his “corroboration”.

“Without saying whether his simulator showed them in retrograde motion,^{^[39]},^{^[40]} Nilesh Oak simply states that the “Voyager simulation showed that all planets were going away from (towards east) the Sun, with the exception of Pluto. Pluto was retrograde.” This means except Pluto none of the other planets (he mentions only five apart from Pluto – viz. Neptune, Mars, Venus, Mercury and Jupiter) were retrograde at that time. But Voyager shows them moving towards east! And his planetary list of the seven planets includes Mars which he locates at 46.6 ̊ behind the sun^{^[41]} on the very next day– a distance at which Mars can never go retrograde. I leave it to the reader to judge the merit of Nilesh Oak’s claim of these non-retrograde planets (except Pluto which he treats as stationary due to its slow movement) moving towards east and the inclusion of two outer most planets in this list.”

(16) Experiment No 25: “Brightly shining comets (!) in the sky”

Nothing is corroborated here as his Simulator does not show any comets in his time line. So he rejects the comet theories of others and repeats the same manipulations of planetary positions that I exposed above. That a comet or asteroid hit the earth at that time is beyond his power of comprehension.

(17) Experiment No 26: “Shweta (near Chitra) & Shyama (near Jyeshtha)” (Mahabharata reference No 19, 20)

Mere speculations and he himself does not claim any corroboration by stating that he had ‘presented multiple scenarios to emphasize the point that unless we have additional information, we should consider the identification (and consequently corroboration) of the planets described in these Mahabharata observations as unresolved.”^{^[42]}

However the names of these planets were resolved by me in the 4^th chapter.

(18) Experiment No 27: “Comet attacking Pushya” (Mahabharata references No 21, 22)

Nilesh Oak conjectures that this was Haley’s comet. It was not in the vicinity of visibility. However this was “corroborated” by him on the basis of the assumption that Mahabharata people had the “ability to see objects far smaller and distant in the sky, the ability as such already assumed during the discussion of Uranus, Neptune and Pluto.”^{^[43]}

So far we have seen all the ‘Corroborations” that Nilesh Oak has given to ‘establish’ that the planets were aligned for his date of Mahabharata war. These are boasted off as 300+ references corroborated by him. In reality none of what he had ‘corroborated’ stand scrutiny and can at best be branded as manipulations.

Similar trend is seen in the 8^th chapter on corroborating the astronomy events on the first day of the war in his timeline. As there is no substance in any of the features he explained, I am producing them in a table with a remark alongside. Nilesh Oak believes that there was a solar eclipse on the 1^st day of the war and hence collected all possible verses to corroborate his timeline. He completely disregards the late moon-rise on the 14^th day of the war which pre-supposes that the war started in waxing phase and waning phase was running for most of the days of the war.

Ex No	Mahabharata references in his book	Feature	Nilesh Oak	Remarks
28	9,27,28,29,64	Lunar eclipses	Solar eclipse on 1^st day of war & Lunar eclipse on the 15^th day of war	Wrong. War started in waxing phase. Late Moonrise on 14^th day of war indicates Amawasya nearing.
29	29	Two eclipses separated by 13 days	Two eclipses separated by 23 days	Wrong.
30	34,35	Solar eclipse on the 1^st day of war	Solar eclipse on the 1^st day of war	Wrong.
31	34	Sun appeared in split parts.	Proposes eclipse	Wrong.
32	34	Flames of the sun visible.	Proposes eclipse	Wrong.
33	35	Morning sun splendour lost.	Proposes eclipse	Wrong.
34	36	Disappearance of the sun in the middle of battle.	Proposes eclipse	Wrong.
35	38	Sun and the moon seen on Amawasya	Proposes Amawasya	Analogy for Satyaki and Abhimanyu joining together to fight.
36	40,41,43,47, 49,37,	Moon references in first 11 days of war	Proposes waxing phase	All are analogies.
	37, 40, 42, 45, 46	Warriors fighting late at night, exhausted	Proof for Amawasya on 1^st day.	Can happen on any day of the war
37	48	Moon rising with pointed heads down	Supports Amawasya on 1^st day	Lunar eclipse.
38	51, 52, 53, 55,56, 60,61,62,63,65, 66,71, 72,67,68, 69, 70	Moon appears like Full Moon last 7 days of war	Supports Amawasya on 1^st day	All are analogies. Oak admits “rich in full moon analogies”
39	50	Full Moon near Krittika	Full Moon on 12^th day	Analogy of Bhagadatta described as similar to full moon near Krittika
40	57	Moon between two Vishakhas.	16^th day of war. Moon in Punarvasu. But proof for Full Moon, thereby corroborating Amawasya on the 1^st day	Analogy of how Pandyaraj’s head was split by Aswatthama’s weapon as though moon was split between 2 Vishakhas
41	58	Sons of Draupadi protecting Dhrishtadyumna	5 stars protected the moon (simulation)	Analogy
42	59	2 Panchal warriors behind Yudhishthir	2 Punarvasus behind Moon	Analogy
43	64	Yudhishthir free from misery	Moon free from Rahu	Analogy
44	-	Insertion of additional month	To complete Balarama’s Tirtha Yatra in simulator	Ad hoc, arbitrary, manipulative
45	73	Meaning of Yojayet	Manipulates as ‘Yojante’	Ad hoc, arbitrary, manipulative
46	73	Jyeshtha Amawasya	Suits his modified timeline	Amawasya in Jyeshtha occurs every year
47	74	Krishna leaving on Revati nakshatra	Interprets Maitri as Anuradha	Maitri here refers to Muhurta
48	75	Balarama left Pandava camp on Anuradha	Nothing corroborated	-
49	76	Secret meeting of Yudhishthir near Full Moon day	Proposes Full Moon nearing	Analogy
50	77, 78, 79	Both armies leaving for Kuruskhetra on Pushya day	Fixes the date in simulator	Every month Pushya day comes.
51	80	Both armies arrive at Kurukshetra on Magha day	Fixes the date in simulator	Every month Magha day comes.
52	81,82, 83	Krishna Nirvana	Cites 2 eclipses within 13 days	Mahabharata tells about only Amawasya coming on the 13^th day

The other experiments such as those pertaining to Abhijit and conflicting observations in Mahabharata were already discussed in previous chapters. In all, only around 100 Mahabharata references are ‘corroborated’, nay ‘manipulated’ by Nilesh Nilkanth Oak. None of the so-called corroborations are found valid. But what has Nilesh Oak got to say? His recent tweet says that his book contains stuff worth 5+ award winning Ph.D theses!

This ‘revolutionary’ discoverer waiting for recognition as a Kepler or Newton, when finding nothing of that kind coming along knows how to ‘manipulate’ – a trait that he has well demonstrated in his book. The Master Manipulator was seen at his Best Form when he tweeted about “Hot from the Press” of SC deciding to test his results on AV observation, and scores of people congratulating him thinking that the Supreme Court of India had sought to validate his research!

In reality ‘SC’ turned out to be an abbreviation of a person who had commented in his blog.^{^[44]}

He deliberately created hype by this tweet and had no shame in accepting the accolades pouring on him from unsuspecting readers. For once he revealed in a reply that SC was the abbreviation of a person, but that was lost in the thread that others did not expand and read. The result was excitement over ‘SC’ decision to test his A-V observation. One of the readers even wondered why there aren’t more than 10,000 re-tweets for this revelation!!

A-V observation or the so-called Epoch of Arundhati being central to both the date of Mahabharata and Ramayana deduced by Nilesh Nilkanth Oak, he is found to be rigorously promoting his theme hoping for claim and acclaim as a Newton or Galileo or Kepler. At best these tricks can help him promote the sales of his books. But this theme being a high risk one, a rebuttal of it destroys Oak’s date of Mahabharata and also Ramayana. What he characterized as a Mystery in his book on dating Mahabharata had turned out to be a myth!

We are in an age when people easily fall prey to deceitful and manipulative works. This critique is meant for them. People must be on guard against attempts to distort established traditions in the name of scientific research. Arundhati’s continuing relevance as an icon of pativratā must stir-up the Dharmic conscience in us in the current context. People of this great country having a rich tradition must seek and also be fed with right knowledge. Let them move from untruth to truth, from darkness to Light.

[1] “When Did The Mahabharata War Happen?” Page 120-121.

[2] “When did the Mahabharata war happen?” Page 79

[3] Mahabharata: 6-3- 24 & 25 http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/mbs/mbs06003.htm

[4] “When did the Mahabharata war happen?” Page 77.

[5] “When did the Mahabharata war happen?” Page 36.

[6] Mahabharata: 6-3-14 http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/mbs/mbs06003.htm

[7] “When did the Mahabharata war happen?” Page 79.

[8] “On the identification of Brahmarashi with nakshatra Abhijit” https://nileshoak.wordpress.com/2016/10/07/on-the-identification-of-brahmarashi-with-nakshatra-abhijit/

[9] “When did the Mahabharata war happen?” Page 79.

[10] Mahabharata:6-3-27

[11] “When did the Mahabharata war happen?” Page 80 & 81.

[12] Ibid. Page 81.