Where do Indians come from? – Part 2

If you haven’t already heard Part 1 of this series, please listen to the previous episode first. This will all make a lot more sense then!

In the last episode we traced our ancestors from billions of years ago when the earth was formed to 50,000 years ago. We take the story forward from there through the different civilizations and invasions to finally answer the question — who our ancestors are and where we Indians come from?

If you haven’t already heard Part 1 of this series, please listen to the previous episode first. This will all make a lot more sense then!

In the last episode we traced our ancestors from billions of years ago when the earth was formed to 50,000 years ago. We take the story forward from there through the different civilisations and invasions to finally answer the question — who our ancestors are and where we Indians come from?

Show Notes

All clips and voices used in this podcast are owned by the original creators

Links to clips used in this episode —

Full Transcript of Episode 49 –

“For the first time we will see the face of these people.”

This normal sounding sentence was spoken with great excitement and curiosity referring to people who lived in India almost 5000 years ago. 

—

For many years, archeologists have been digging around Harappan cities to find more clues about the people of the Indus Valley Civilization. And in 2015, this happened:

[we hear a news report about the findings of Rakhigarhi]

Rakhigarhi, is in the Hisar district of Haryana. It was one of the Harappan cities — and in 2015, archeologists found a number of skeletons along with other remains here. For the next few years, this site caused quite a bit of controversy in India. 

Why? Because according to the lead Archeologist, Vasant Shinde, these skeletons prove that Aryans were not invaders in the country…and Harappans themselves went on to become the Vedic people of India. 

A little confusing, right?

In this episode, we’ll try to understand what exactly this means. Who were the Harappans and Aryans? What did they do? And finally, we’ll try to answer the age-old question: where did we come from?

---

Welcome back to Maha Bharat, a Spotify Original podcast that explains how India works. This is an ATS STUDIO production, and I’m Dhruv Rathee.

This is part 2 of a 2 episode series that answers the question – Who are the first Indians and where do they come from. If you haven’t already heard the 1st part, I recommend that you go listen to the previous episode and then come back here. 

Doston, If I told you to guess the one thing in history that absolutely (puri tareeke se) changed the way humans live, what your guess be?

If you guessed agriculture, you’re right. 

Agriculture led to the beginning of a proper civilization in India. The First Indians who came to India from Africa were hunter-gatherers. Iska matlab hai that every family had to hunt for their food and protect themselves. This was how it was for nearly 50,000 years! 

Finally, around 9000 years ago, agriculture came to India. Now, this is a little different from how you and I imagine agriculture is. Are you thinking about vast fields with crops and an irrigation system? That’s not what agriculture looked like 9000 years ago. Societies started growing crops for themselves — the main ones were wheat (गेहूँ) and barley (जौ). Animals like sheep and goats were domesticated (paala gaya). Many years later, rice, fruits and vegetables were grown.

Doston, agriculture didn’t just change the way we ate. We learnt how to cultivate food in large quantities — aur isse yeh hua, ki many people in the society now became free to do other jobs! Think about it: if you could buy your food from a farmer, then you have time to build houses or make utensils from clay. Or to make art, inscriptions, jewellery, trade with other cities. A whole new type of society began. 

Lekin ab, sabse important saval: where did it start first?

When we ask questions like these, we can never be sure about the answer. Scientists make a guess based on the evidence found so far…but remember, maybe we will find some more evidence in the future! 

Coming back to agriculture — did you think the Indus Valley Civilization was the first to practice agriculture?

That’s not correct!

There’s actually a settlement that existed long before — and mein aapko bata du, this settlement led to the Indus Valley Civilization. This was the Mehrgarh settlement. Despite this site being nearly 9000 years old, we discovered it only about 45 years ago! If agriculture was practiced before this in India, we haven’t found the site yet to prove it.

Aate hai Mehrgarh par. In 1976, a French Archeological Mission started digging in Mehrgarh, a site which is in Balochistan in Pakistan today. They dug through nine metres, which is as much as a 3 storey building — and at the very bottom, they found something that changed our history. 

They found Houses! 

There were houses and storage spaces made from bricks and mud. Along with this, there were sickles and remains of wheat, barley and animals, too. This suggested that the residents practiced agriculture and herding (जानवरों का पशुचारण). Iske saath saath they found buried skeletons, pots, jewellery, and figurines, 9 metres under the ground.

But the most exciting find was this: when these remains were tested, it was found that the first people to settle in Mehrgarh came here 9000 years ago — about 2000 years before the Harappans! The Mehrgarh settlement started in 7000 BC. 

In a way, the practices in Mehrgarh changed the Indian people. Here we found fibres from clothes — matlab, they were also growing cotton and making clothes out of it. For the next few thousand years, they developed new methods of agriculture, taking care of cattle, designing and building new types of houses. 

Okay, let’s take a minute to understand what this means. Over 5000 years, the people of Mehrgarh learnt agriculture, pottery and ceramics. The agricultural practices became better with time. This tells us that the process of agriculture was learnt and developed by the people of Mehrgarh locally. Their practices of pottery eventually led to using metals…and this led to the Bronze Age. So, these practices were passed on to younger generations. The discovery of Mehrgarh helps us understand when exactly it started. 

The Mehrgarh settlement went on until 2600 BC.

Lekin doston, mudde ka sawal yeh hai: who are these agriculturists of Mehrgarh? Are they Indians — are they our ancestors?

The archeological evidence I just told you about had not been able to answer these questions very well. But the answer was finally found after recent DNA testing of skeletons found in this region and the Indus Valley region. And what did we find? Let’s break this down.

The agriculturists of Mehrgarh consisted of two populations: one, the First Indians who settled here. Remember, the Out of Africa Migrants?.

Well, that makes sense — after all, the African migrants had come to India thousands of years ago. By this time, they had been living in India for thousands of years, and were the indigenous Indian people. It’s possible that they were already settled in Mehrgarh and even started agricultural practices there before 7000 B.C. 

But here’s the second part of the DNA result:

THe Mehrgarh population also has the DNA of people from the Zagros region of West Iran. How did that happen? The answer is simple and familiar to us: migration!

So more than 9000 years ago, people from West Iran migrated to the area that is Pakistan today. These migrants were farmers, so they may have brought their own technology or knowledge (takniki jaankari). Over thousands of years, the Iranian farmers settled down in Mehrgarh and mixed with the indigenous Indian people there. Over time, new generations formed. They had the DNA of both: indigenous Indians and Iranian Farmers. So these are the people of Mehrgarh. And the question of whether they are our ancestors…well, let me tell you this: they are certainly the ancestors of a very important group of people: The Indus Valley Civilization!

---

[We hear an excerpt about Dholavira]

Dholavira is only one of the great Harappan cities of the Indus Valley Civilization — did you know we have found over a thousand of these? 

Humein malum hi hai, that the Indus Valley Civilization is famous for its architecture, its modernity, the art and trade and the peaceful nature of the people…I could go on and on. We often think of the Harappans as our ancestors. In fact, there are theories that the Harappan people went on to become the Vedic Aryans, the ancestors of Hindus in India. Well…let’s break this down!

But first, a quick recap: The first Indians came to India more than 65,000 years ago. They started cultivating land in Mehrgarh 9000 years ago, in 7000 BC. Unki milavat hui with Iranian farmers who migrated there. These people went on to become the Harappan population around 5000 BC. With me so far?

By 2000 BC, they spread across the northern part of our subcontinent. Don’t forget how large this civilization was — it stretched roughly from present-day Pakistan to Uttar Pradesh, aur lambai mein from Afghanistan to Gujarat. This is almost one-third of the area of India today! 

So the Merhgarh people were the ancestors of the Harappan people. And How did we come to know of this? The answer is in Rakhigarhi! In a scientific paper, one the authors of which is Vasant Shinde, we see that the Harappan skeleton found in Rakhigarhi had DNA from Iranians as well as Indian hunter-gatherers. And as you will remember, this is the DNA of the Mehrgarh people as well!

Chalo, yeh ek sawal ka jawab mil gaya.

The Harappans lived a long, long time ago, but we still have many things in common with them. Clearly, they have passed them down through the years. Jaise ki, we have found clay pots in which the Harappan people cooked their meals. Isme 2 dilchasp cheezein hai. One, the pots look just like the handis that we use in our kitchens — matlab, round from the button, with a ridge on top to hold it.  And the other similarity – the food! A recent study discovered that 4000 years ago, the harappans cooked a curry consisting of Aubergine (baingan), ginger (adrak), salt and turmeric. The ingredients and the method are much like anything we cook at home! The harappans also used to wear bangles, used a “lota” in their toilets and worshipped the peepal trees. These are familiar to us today, too.

So naturally, the next question to ask is this: are Harappans our ancestors? The answer is yes, but in a small part!

This is where it gets interesting. There is one more group of migrants in our timeline after Harappans. And these are the Aryans. The Aryans are surely our ancestors. So, if the Harappan people went on to become the Aryans, they would certainly be our ancestors. But here’s the intriguing bit: the Harappan culture does not have many similarities with the Aryans. So where did the Harrapans go, and who did they pass their culture on to?

---

We’ve finally come to the two groups of Indians that have caused debate and disagreement for years: the Aryans and the Dravidans. 

But before I tell you more about them, we should know that the terms Aryans and Dravidans are somewhat redundant (bematlab) today. How? Okay, here is where it might get a little confusing, but hear me out.

When you look at the DNA of most Indians — me and you both — no matter in which part of the country we stay, you will find two distinct lines of ancestry.  

Scientists have named these two groups as: ANI and ASI — Ancient North Indian and Ancient South Indian. Don’t worry about remembering these names — all you have to know is that these were the two groups that lived in North and South India thousands of years ago. Generally, the North Indians were descendants of the Aryans, and South Indians were descendants of the Dravidians. Residents of North-east India usually have another line of ancestry in them — of the Austro-Asiatic and Tibetan language speakers. Simple shabdo mein, their ancestors were migrants from Chinese regions. So these were the three groups.

But since then, these groups have mixed and mingled all over the country. North went to South, and vice versa. So, none of us can be called purely Aryan or purely Dravidan! 

Chaliye, let’s come back to where we left off in history. 

The Harappan civilization survived for nearly 4000 years. During this time, the Harappan people traded with other civilizations like Mesopotomia — and do you know how we know this? We found Harappan seals buried in present-day Turkey and Syria, where the Mesopotamian civilization existed! 

There is one more important detail here: the people of the Indus Valley Civilization, curious as all humans are, also travelled toward Southern India, mixing with the Indigenous people (yaha ke mool nivasi) of those regions. This was around 3000 years ago. So it’s possible that the new generations of South India at this time — matlab, dravidians — came from the Harappan people

Now, this theory is questioned a lot and you might even ask how we know that this happened. There is a very interesting answer!

Researchers have gathered proof in 2 different ways to conclude that the Harappan people are the ancestors of South Indians. 

One is DNA, like we’ve seen before. The DNA of South Indians has a trace of the Zargos people of Iran — remember, the farmers who were the descendants of Harappans? This can only mean that South Indians, too, have Harappan blood in them. So one method proves it.

The second method is interesting, too — it’s language. The Harappans did have a language of their own. But we haven’t been able to decipher their script completely, which is why we still don’t know about the Harappans government and way of life. But this doesn’t mean that the researchers gave up on figuring the language out. Since the Harappan people were descendants of the Iranian farmers, it’s safe to guess that their language had elements of the ancient Iranian language, Elamite. 

So, here’s the last piece of this puzzle. The South Indian or Dravidian languages today — largely Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Tulu have been studied deeply. And we found that there are a lot of similarities between these languages and the Iranian language! For instance, the word for “small” is puttu in south Indian languages as well as the Iranian language.

This can mean that the Harappans, speakers of the Iranian language, travelled down south very early on, when the south Indian languages were still being developed. They mixed with the indigenous people of the south, creating new languages, cultures and lineage. This is the lineage that we call the Dravidians. In simpler words — the fact that South Indian languages are similar to Iranian languages is not a coincidence. There must be a group of people who brought this language to them — and this was most likely the Harappans.

So that solves the mystery of who the Dravidians are. The next question is: how are the Aryans?

In around 1600 B.C., the Indus Valley cities suffered climatic change, like a long drought. The Harappan people migrated to different parts of the country to survive it. Slowly, the civilization ended. Right around this time, a new group of migrants came to India, settling down in the North.

---

Doston, kabhi socha hai, why some English words sound strangely similar to Hindi or Sanskrit words? No no, I’m not talking about hindi words that have been added to English language, like Guru or Pyjama. These have been added quite recently. 

I’m talking about different words that sound similar. For instance, have you noticed how close in meaning the words “mother” and “matr” are? Or “pedal” and “paidal”, both of which have something to do with feet? Or what about “star” and “sitara”? These are words of completely different languages, which sound similar and mean almost the same thing! That’s because English and Sanskrit actually belong to one family of languages – the Indo-European languages. Common words from this family went into different languages like Sanskrit, German, Greek and changed over time.

This is such a fascinating evolution…but doesn’t it make you wonder: who first started to speak the original language? This group must have either been in Europe or India, and then traveled and spread the language around, right? Well, this is the big debate that I want to end our episode with!

There is a theory that it was us Indians who spoke the original Indo-European language, and then travelled all around Europe and gave our language and culture to them. Many Indians believe that it was a group called Aryans, indigenous to India, who travelled to other parts of the world. But we have concrete answers to fight this debate now, thanks to DNA evidence. 

Let’s go back to our timeline again to find out. 

1500 B.C. — the Harappans have scattered around. East India has migrants from Tibet, Burma and China. South Indians have already begun to form their own languages, culture and arts. Soon, Tamil will develop in this region, and it will be one of the world’s oldest languages. 

Like I mentioned, In the northern region, new migrants arrived from an area in Central Asia. This area was called the Kazakh Steppe (pronounced “step”). Let me tell you about these migrants: they did animal husbandry, lived in villages and were very religious. 

So when they came to India, they brought with themselves their language, rituals and practices. They settled down in the north. These migrants were part of a group of people called “Yamnaya” of Central Asia. Okay, so how do we know all this? Through DNA evidence. Baat yeh hai, that we know for sure Aryans are our ancestors. And DNA evidence shows us that we, Indians, have the DNA of the Yamnaya. So this can possibly mean that Aryans are the missing links — our Yamnaya ancestors. But here’s the next part you should know: the Europeans also have the DNA from the Yamanayas!

So put this puzzle together — both Indians and Europeans have a common ancestor, from from a group of people in Central Asia, who travelled to both places. No one group went from India to Europe, or ulte tareeke se. This DNA evidence has settled the debate!

Anyway, the Yamnaya migrants came to India and mixed with the people here, in around 1500 B.C. The lineage of this mixture (iss milavat se aayi peedhi) was called the Aryans. You may have heard about the theory of Aryans invading India and pushing the Dravidians to the south. There is no way to know if this happened for sure — but scientists believe that this is simply a theory that the British peddled (felaya) to divide us. In reality, it’s possible that the Aryans came and mixed with the people, including the Dravidians.

So, these migrants settled down here, started writing down their rituals and beliefs. They started a new way of family and community. These writings are called the Vedas — jinme se, Rigveda is the oldest book. The culture they practiced came to be known as the Vedic culture. Hinduism grew from this Vedic culture. 

And what happened to the Harappans? Well, some of them assimilated with the Aryans — but iss statement mein bhi doubt hai. Because whenever two cultures mix, you can see the proof in their language or traditions. But the Vedic culture is really different from the Harappan culture! The worship of gods, the animals…this wasn’t seen in the Harppans. Even the fact that the Vedic people did not build cities, something the Harappans were so fond of. So, Harappans are possibly not the ancestors of the Aryans. They simply mixed with the different groups of people in the country, and their culture dheere dheere died off. 

Eventually, the vedic culture spread far and wide. New rituals and divisions were formed, like the caste system. Lekin doston, the claim that Aryans came to India and imposed the caste system on the people is not quite right. In his book Early Indians, Tony Joseph explains the results from DNA testing, which show that there was great mixing between Indians even after the Aryans arrived, until about 100 B.C. There was no barrier from marrying into different groups. But around 100 B.C., quite suddenly, this mixing stopped. Perhaps a new, strong ideology came around. The population got divided into the four varnas or classes: Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. These were then divided into even more castes, or jatis. That was the beginning of the caste system in India. 

---

That was quite a history!

So, is there really one answer to “where we come from”? A DNA test will tell you that you’re a descendant of Africans, Iranians and Central Asians! Aur toh aur, The Aryans were not the last migrants — after that, Mughals came to India and settled down. Invaders and migrants from Portugal, France and England came to our country. Refugees from Tibet, Sri Lanka and Myanmar have come and settled down here. 

We are the descendants of all of these Indians.