DW BUREAU / Chandigarh Haryana Governor Shri Bandaru Dattatreya released the book " River Saraswati and the Aryans " authored by P. Lal, a retired IPS officer of Punjab, in a simple ceremony held at Raj Bhawan on Wednesday. The book deals with the vexed issues of ancient Indian history including the antiquity of the Vedic culture and the existence of river Saraswati in the remote past which has been described as a mighty ,physical ,flowing river in the Rig Veda but which does not flow now. The author has concluded that Vedic culture is 6,000- 7,000 BCE old. Further , that the channels of the present day monsoon fed Ghaggar- Hakra carried the waters of the ancient Saraswati. The author has eugolised the efforts of the Haryana and Himachal Pradesh governments to recharge the channels by constructing a dam at Adi Badri. The author has quoted scientific studies combined with linguistic, archeological , textual ,astronomical and genetics evidence in support of his findings and traced the history of population movements starting from Africa thousands of years ago. He argues that there has been no Aryan migration into the Indian subcontinent from outside, that the Vedic culture which was rural and Harappan culture which was urban were complementary to each other , and the former which existed from much before the latter , survived being more resilient whereas the Harappan civilisation vanished due to natural disasters. He has also tried to show the connection between the Rigvedic Saraswati and the invisible Saraswati at the Triveni at Prayagraj, and how the Saraswati came to be deified as the Goddess of Learning. The book has comments by eminent people such as Gurbachan Jagat, former governor Manipur; Tankeshwar Kumar, Vice Chancellor , Central University of Haryana, Mahendragarh; Dr RK Kohli , Vice Chancellor , Amity University Punjab ,Mohali; Binod Kumar , former Director, Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration , Mussoorie; Professor ( Retd) Ashvini Agrawal , former head of Ancient Indian History , Culture & Archaeology department of Panjab University , and JS Bawa, former director, central bureau of investigation. Forewords have been written by KN Pathak, former Vice Chancellor Panjab University and Saroj Bala , retired IRS officer and former member Central Board of Direct Taxes who had also worked as Director, Institute of Scientific Research on Vedas. (editor@dailyworld.in)