I accept that we have not been good at keeping records and cannot provide exact proof of our grandparent’s formal education. You will have to take my word for it, as in my part of world, the word goes longer than the US Treasury Bill. By extension of the logic my grandfather would have made similar claims if the question was indeed presented to him. This iterative process will lead us back in history 5500 years old Harappan dugout, where the world’s first writing inscriptions were found (see figure below). This is as much evidence one could produce by means of deduction logic to one’s rich cultural heritage and education background.

Anyone with basic SMS texting skills can translate this inscription to be read as “My Eyes are Square (sore) – (signed) V”. The initials V could stand for Vikramadatya or Venketeshwaram but let us not get personal here. Excited by the early success on my abilities to interpret ancient script, I set out for some in-depth research. Thankfully the folks at Harappa.com have meticulously documented and made the artifacts available for public scrutiny.  I vaguely recollect from my early education that our 5000 years old Vedic culture was capable of farming and agriculture, building cities with sanitation, tools and traditions, beauty and cosmetics, administration and taxes, Gods and Kings, Heavens and Sacrifices etc… It is not hard to imagine that this would not have been possible without preliminary language skills, unless of course you believe that our ancestors were mime artists and they used hand-signals. The Harappan dugout has found a number of inscriptions which has lead to the greatest unsolved puzzle of our times, the Indus Script.

What prompted me to jump in the fray? Well, I accidentally bumped into a heart rending article on a wrapping, while munching peanuts  at India Gate, claiming that Indus Script is not a language. It is natural to have difference of opinion on matters of education system even in the modern times. However, Prof Steve Farmer of University of Illinois has taken a rather extreme view and challenged the core belief by his proclamation that Indus Script is nothing but a myth. It is not even a “writing system” and anyone who can provide proof to the contrary can claim $10,000 prize. Well $10K is not much of a reward to go after this challenge wholeheartedly but the satisfaction of fighting for the justice for our mute great grandparents is a worthy and noble cause.

Indians believe that language was first introduced on planet earth by Lord Siva by the powerful sound emanating from His Damru. Unfortunately Panini documented this fact only in the 4th Century BC. We still have a few thousand years unaccounted to satisfy Prof Farmer challenge. There is not much we can do by means of further digging to find additional proofs as to why the students did not keep elaborate notes in classroom during the Harappan times? I can only offer some practical guidance from my personal experience as a student. Our Professor of Marketing Management was an eloquent orator, who did not believe in providing notes before the lectures and did not like being interrupted during. We were learning 4 P’s of marketing, I opened my notebook and started making notes. We were still on the second P and the professor took his usual digression to explain the importance of advertisement; not sure how this was connected with second P, I started drawing doodles on the notebook. I was giving finishing touches to my artwork, just then I hear the mention of fourth P! Startled, I look around, everyone was absorbed in the melody, reluctantly I nudge my fellow student to provide some details on the third P? He wasn’t making any notes as a matter of principle. In his view making notes and learning cannot happen simultaneously. He was not going to be deprived of the 4th P comprehension to help me complete the 3rd P note! The commotion rising from our desk disturbed the symphony of the lecture and I was asked to leave the classroom. Since then additional P’s have been added to the subject and they say that there are up to 22 immutable laws of marketing. As a sales person, till date I rue making notes in the marketing class. This explanation provides sufficient evidence that during the olden days students learned only through verbal instructions and passed it on from generation to generation. It is perhaps the doodle art drawn by handful of distracted students that were found in the Harappa digging. Professor Farmer must have independently come to the same conclusion from his research on the Indus Script and pattern of learning habits of Asian students in his class.

Though the above explanation merits attention but to say that all sales people did in classroom is doodle-art for good thousand years is a bit of stretch. Apparently students of Harappan times kept gentle reminder to help recite lengthy passages. For example, if someone wanted to make speech at the temple before donating 1/16 part of his hard earned crop to God, they will get a tattoo inscribed just outside the temple using the template -. Considering the fact that Indus Script was more of a Sales Tool it will be hard to find repeatable patterns and long texts. There were guidelines for salesmen to not exceed more than 10 characters in a customer presentation tablet and no more than 2 tablets per presentation were allowed. These restrictions forced the language to evolve horizontally. A large number of characters were introduced to memorize different products, value propositions and their selling business models. This style was later adopted by Chinese visitors and there are good 47,000 characters in Kangxi dictionary. The Japanese linguists accidently dropped 37,000 characters in East China Sea, hence they had to manage with just 10,000 characters in the Kanji script. My eastern friends tell me that in modern times, learning only 500 characters is sufficient to get a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering.

I have come up with a basic framework under which a language system can be constructed from the Indus Script. This framework is simple to follow -

Let us put this theory to test right away. We have taken Table 1 for our understanding purpose -

Interactive Interpretations of Indus Tablet 1 -

A. Social Networking Advertisement: The resident of our town, our very own water-boy (Bobby), turns 16 on the 4th week of Autumn in the year of Ox. He is now an eligible bachelor willing to mingle with the society girls for pre-nuptial activities on Social Networking Sites. The bearer of this seal must be granted permission to enter local bar, gambling house and dance hall. This advertisement is brought to you by XII Farm Real Estate Agents who swear full allegiance to the king and our Birdie Kingdom.

B: Universal Cattle ID Project: By the order of our King, all cattle in our heavenly kingdom will now bear the new seal. The seal can be procured from your nearest polling temple by depositing 6.33% earning from dairy products. All the seals issued in the past are invalid from the date mentioned on the new seal. Any cattle found without the new seal will be confiscated and will become the property of Temple Authorities. Government officials should appoint the water-carriers in their county to inspect the cattle by lifting the tail and search for the seal at the appointed location. Any deviation in the seal position or pattern must be immediately reported. The Hologram of our Kingdom and our Sponsors must be painted in Green for copyright protection act. Our kingdom is committed to Green Planet and our patented technology to reduce Methane Emission from the new breed of Farm Animals will be available before the next breeding season.

C: Announcing Sacrifice Ceremony: Water-man has won million rupiah in the national weekly lotto results announced recently. All and sundry are invited to the Sun Temple for a Young Male Bull Sacrifice Ceremony followed by Song and Dance Party organized by the lucky winner.

Any of the these interpretations could be right. We need to put this though the web 2.0 taxonomy test.