"There are four Great Classical Civilizations in the Old World: from the east, China, India, Mesopotamia and Egypt. Of these, it is generally known and acknowledged that the Great Civilizations of China, Mesopotamia and Egypt go back beyond 3000 BCE, since detailed records are avaiḷable about their kings and dynasties, the major political events in their ancient history, the wars fought by them, their scientific and cultural achievements and their contributions to the world ̶ and the chronology of all these historical details is, more or less, known with reasonable accuracy. All these details are known and acknowledged about Classical Indian Civilization also in all these matters, but all of it pertains only to the period after 600 BCE or so. Of the four Great Civilizations of the Old World, the civilization of India alone stands apart in the fact that its history before 600 BCE is supposed to be a big blank in all these matters! The Great Indian civilization, whose remains were discovered by archaeologists in the early twentieth century on the banks of the Indus and the now dried-up Sarasvati, and whose beginnings (like those of the other Great Civilizations) go back well beyond 3000 BCE, is alleged to be a totally different civilization from the later Classical one, of a totally different people speaking a totally different language and having a totally different religion and culture!"