Almost everyone has heard George Santayana’s aphorism, who said that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Alexander the Great failed to conquer Afghanistan, but more than two thousand years later, the Russians and the Americans tried and both failed. Napoleon invaded Russia, only to be defeated by winter, but Hitler thought he could do better, for some reason.

Are we reaching an era where we could repeat the history narrated in the Great Indian Epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana? But hey, that was just a beautiful poetic imagination… Really either there was a much superior Indian civilization with possible contacts with extraterrestrial visitors, test tube babies and flying machines (Vimanas) and so on…

Alien contact could be seen as all the gods residing in heaven from where they bestowed their blessings on humanity. Sadhus did Tapasya for years to gratify the Gods in heaven who, when pleased with their disciples, would come from heaven (? Planets other than earth) to bless them and give them special powers (? Extraterrestrials who were more advanced in technologies than man ). Arjuna once visited Lord Indra’s place to learn various new technologies.

Medical science in Indian epics can be a topic for a dissertation. That many advances were written there. Dhritrashtra had 100 children born from a clay pot (in vitro fertilization). They could transplant the head of an elephant when Lord Ganesha was decapitated (Xeno-transplantation). Shukracharya, the guru of Danavas, knew of the Sanjivani mantra that could revive a dead person. The embryo transfer that Balarama exchanged with a girl in Gokul cannot be understood even with today’s ultramodern advances in obstetrics.

Indian gods and heroes fought their battles in the skies using piloted vehicles. The accuracy of these descriptions cannot be just a coincidence. Certain explanations in the Vyamanika Shastra seem too detailed and technical to be labeled as myth. They were similar to modern jet-powered flying devices. Various texts cited secrets related to the operations of the Vimanas, some of which could be compared to the modern use of radar, solar power, and photography. These ancient flying devices were made of special heat-absorbing metals called ‘Somaka, Soundalike and Mourthwika’. These texts also extensively discussed different types of mirrors and lenses installed on board for defensive and offensive purposes. The ‘Marika’ weapon could fire at enemy aircraft in a similar way to modern laser technology. Not to forget Ravana who flew from India to Sri Lanka, taking Seeta with him.

The weapons they used were out of the world. The arrows in his quiver could cause a lot of destruction by producing various forms of energies ranging from fire to rain to hurricanes, they could hypnotize a large number of soldiers at the same time (Sammohan astra), they could poison the enemy with snakes (? Biological warfare ). When Rama killed Ravana with Bramhaastra, Ravana had a chance to neutralize him with his own Bramhaastra, but he walked away from it fearing the destruction of the world… does atomic war ring a bell to anyone now?

Even on the technological front, the Indian civilization was very advanced. Who can forget the Sanjay who narrated the entire war from Mahabharata to Dhritrashtra, like a live broadcast that we enjoy on TV today? Astrology was very accurate… that’s why Krishna was able to understand and hide the Sun (or we can call it a solar eclipse) when Arjuna had vowed to kill Jayadratha in one day.

Depictions of space travel, destruction by incredible weapons, and the fact that Vimanas resembled unidentified modern flying objects would suggest that India had a “superior but forgotten civilization.” If we had such a great story to brag about, where did it all evaporate? Probably, some disaster occurred and the entire civilization died out. Was it natural or man-made? We cannot explain it with the current data available. But all we can do is learn from them, otherwise we will turn the Earth into a graveyard for humanity just like they did…