Source: The Times of India
NEW DELHI, INDIA, November 13, 2000: Establishing the location of the Saraswati River alluded to in ancient Indian religious literature would authenticate its existence as a mighty Himalayan river. Over 160 Indus sites were nurtured by the Saraswati, far from the Indus River Valley. Now satellite photos and ground studies of clay, silt, sand and gravel deposits establish the course of the river from the Himalayan foothills to the Sind gulf. This enormous river, over five miles across from shore to shore, changed its course four times always in a westerly direction. Initially flowing from the Himalayas in a south-west direction about 4000 bce, the Saraswati disappeared sometime between 2000 bce and 1500 bce With the disappearance of the Saraswati River and the migration it caused, the Ganges and Indus River populations became the central focus towards the end of the early Vedic period.