Documenting the Ancient Sanskrit Records

Did Its Keepers Know What They Were Preserving?

Iqbal Ahmad

Iqbal61@yahoo.co.in

Without any doubt, one should take care of one's spoken dialect, which, for centuries, has been serving as the medium of communication for the common people, although it has hardly served as a written language and never as the official language of its people.

As records suggest, it was Sanskrit and Persian that filled the written and official language space left open by the mother tongue.

The earliest handwritten documents and manuscripts of the classical ages are found in the Sanskrit language, and the characters adopted are Sharda. Although it could not preserve this classical language, there is a need to take care of those manuscripts and documents that have been written in Sanskrit and Persian languages. In fact, such old manuscripts and archival documents are being preserved in various archival and library institutions.

If you visit the old libraries and archive repositories, you would definitely come across a number of ancient manuscripts and documents in Sanskrit. Sometimes, you would find such manuscripts written on birch bark leaves and wooden sheets. Everyone cannot decipher these characters. There are only a few experts and scholars who can recognize this ancient alphabet and decipher the script. For most others, such ancient literature is beyond their understanding and wisdom.

These ancient records would undoubtedly be most significant, as they pertain to this ancient land and its people. These records have been written in this land and should be genuine documents of classical literature and philosophy. Most of such manuscripts are found in various old institutions of Srinagar and Jammu, namely the Research Library, archival repositories of Jammu and Srinagar, SPS Museum, Srinagar, Dogra Art Museum, Jammu, Centre of Central Asian Studies Museum, Srinagar, and the Jammu and Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages. Surprisingly, at several repositories, even the preservers of these records did not know what they had been preserving.

Kashmiris are proud, and justly so, of the literary glories of their land. For centuries, it was the home of the greatest scholars, and at least two great Indian religions, Shaivism and Buddhism, found some of their most eloquent teachers on the banks of the Vitasta. Some of the greatest Sanskrit poets were born and wrote in the valley, and from it has come, in the Sanskrit language, a world-famous collection of folklore and other historical and literary accounts.

The Sanskrit language and its records are the oldest literary heritage of Kashmir. But, to set the record straight, the language did not serve as the language of the common masses. It was the language of the learned class, officers of Rajas and Maharajas, and the literary classes. Besides, it served as the only written language of this land until the arrival of Persian. Since the introduction of Persian, Sanskrit survived here for a very long period. There are Sanskrit documents and manuscripts from the early 20th century found in various collections of this land. In fact, most of these records are written in Sharda characters, and if you ask somebody about such collections, they would say that these are Sharda manuscripts, while most of them do not know in which language these have been written.

In fact, most of the earliest manuscripts are written in the Sharda alphabet, but the language adopted in these records was Sanskrit, so one can call them Sanskrit records. Kashmir is said to have served as the home of Sanskrit learning. In the words of Grierson, "For upwards of two thousand years Kashmir has been the home of Sanskrit learning, and from this small valley have issued masterpieces of history, poetry, romance, fable and philosophy."

In fact, whatever records of ancient Kashmir are available are entirely in Sanskrit. These Sanskrit records are found written on local paper. I have seen many such manuscripts written on birch bark leaves, locally called burz. Several of these Sanskrit records stand already identified and translated. One such significant example is Kalhana's chronicle, Rajatarangini, which is also written in Sanskrit.

But nowadays, there are several explanatory translations available of this earliest historic 'epic'. And interestingly, who were the first people who undertook this mission? The answer is very clear: those were Europeans. The first-line scholars who undertook the identification and translation work of Sanskrit records were European missionaries. Grierson, George Bühler, and Aurel Stein were among the first-line scholars who studied the earliest Kashmir records.

During the colonial period, Maharaja Ranbir Singh was very much inspired by the research work of these scholars. As such, he founded the first-ever Sanskrit Pathshala at Srinagar and employed proficient Pandits for teaching and learning this language.

He also set up a translation bureau where Sanskrit texts were translated into Persian and Bahri alphabets. The Maharaja was followed by a democratic government, which established an independent and fully equipped research department where many Sanskrit texts were collected, edited, and published. The Research Department of Kashmir, which was set up at Lal Mandi in Srinagar, did a great work in translating a number of Sanskrit works.

Later, during the period of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, the Research Department, which was known as the Research Library, was shifted from Lal Mandi to the Iqbal Library at Kashmir University. However, its management control remained with the Public Libraries Department.

This glorious institution suffered badly at the hands of political and administrative higher-ups, and a time came when it lost its basic purpose of establishment. It could neither collect further manuscripts nor could it continue its translation bureau. As a result, the Sanskrit records got scattered among various non-research organizations. Of course, those organizations also preserved these manuscripts, but they could not translate them into other understandable languages.

These organizations are not to be blamed because most of the people employed there do not know what they have preserved. Besides proper preservation, the Sanskrit records need to be translated so that people can understand the significance of these manuscripts and can also know the wisdom of the ancient land and its people. This is our genuine classical source material through which we can research our past.

No doubt, the Mission Manuscript Scheme launched by the Government of India has been successful in documenting and cataloguing a number of such manuscripts. Besides, the digitization of most of the archival records has also been undertaken.

But it is not sufficient until these manuscripts are translated and studied. Steps are required to be taken to restore the translation bureau of the Research Department and make it functional by providing professional hands to it. That is the only way to protect this heritage and explore the wisdom of the intellectuals of the past.

The scattered Sanskrit records should be brought from different official and unofficial collections and preserved under one roof. The Research and Publication Department may be reorganized, and the translation bureau of this department needs to be reactivated.

The mere preservation, conservation, and exhibition of these archival records cannot serve the ultimate purpose unless and until they are decoded and published in self-explanatory formats.

(The writer is a senior archaeologist and author)