Rakhigarhi

Also called: Rakhi Garhi · Topic: Harappan (Sindhu-Sarasvati) Civilisation · NCERT: Class 6, Ch 6 "The Beginnings of Indian Civilisation"; Class 12, Ch 1 "Bricks, Beads and Bones"

Meaning

Rakhigarhi (also spelt Rakhi Garhi) is a large Harappan city site in Hisar district, Haryana. It lies in the basin of the dried-up Ghaggar river, which NCERT links with the Ṛig Vedic Sarasvatī. It matters because it is one of the five known Harappan "cities", and one of only two that lie in the Sarasvatī (Ghaggar-Hakra) basin rather than the Indus basin. This shows that the civilisation spread well beyond the Indus valley.

Explanation

Background: the river and the basin

• Today the Ghaggar is a seasonal river in India. It flows on into Pakistan as the Hakra. They are one dried or part-time channel that crosses the border.
• NCERT identifies this channel with the Ṛig Vedic Sarasvatī. The Ṛig Veda praises this river as a goddess and says it flowed "from the mountain to the sea" (giribhyaḥ samudrāt).
• According to NCERT, nearly two-thirds of all known Harappan settlements lie in this Sarasvatī basin, not in the Indus basin proper.
• Rakhigarhi sits in this basin, in present-day Haryana.

Its place among Harappan cities

• Five Harappan sites are usually called "cities": Mohenjodaro, Harappa, Dholavira, Ganweriwala and Rakhigarhi.
• Only two of them, Rakhigarhi (Haryana) and Ganweriwala (Cholistan, Pakistan), lie in the Sarasvatī basin.
• Rakhigarhi has been only partly excavated (dug up). Even so, it is judged to be about as large as Harappa, Mohenjodaro and Ganweriwala [3].
• Some recent estimates call it the largest Harappan site. Size estimates vary, though, and most of the site is still unexcavated. So "largest" is best treated as a claim, not a settled fact.

Neighbours in the same basin

• Kalibangan (Hanumangarh district, Rajasthan) is a city/town on the left bank of the Ghaggar. It has a grid plan (streets crossing at right angles) [2].
• Banawali (Fatehabad district, Haryana) sits inside a single enclosure wall and has winding streets, not a grid [3].
• Farmana is a smaller Harappan city or town in the basin. Bhirrana is a smaller settlement.
• Rakhigarhi was the biggest centre in this network of Haryana-Rajasthan sites.

What it tells us

• Sarasvatī-basin cities like Rakhigarhi support the name "Sindhu-Sarasvatī Civilisation".
• Many important sites lie on the Ghaggar-Hakra, not on the Indus.

• So the label "Indus" alone does not show how far the civilisation spread.

• Rakhigarhi also helps us understand the eastward shift in the Late Harappan period.

• Later Vedic and post-Vedic texts say the Sarasvatī slowly dried up and disappeared.

• As the river stopped flowing all year, settlement probably moved east towards the Ganga-Yamuna doab (the land between the two rivers). Haryana sites like Rakhigarhi lie on that route.

• Ancient DNA: Excavations led by the archaeologist Vasant Shinde produced an ancient DNA study published in 2019. According to that study, a Harappan individual from Rakhigarhi showed no steppe ancestry, meaning no genes from the Central Asian grassland herders. The study is used in debates about who the Harappans were, but historians still disagree on what it proves.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: Harappan Civilisation, c. 3500–1300 BCE. The Mature Harappan phase was c. 2600–1900 BCE.
• Place: Hisar district, Haryana, in the Ghaggar (Sarasvatī) basin.
• Excavations: The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) dug here in the late 1990s under Amarendra Nath. Later excavations were led by Vasant Shinde.
• How we know:
• Archaeological digs, which have covered only a small part of the site [3].
• NCERT's account of how Harappan settlements are spread across the Sarasvatī basin.
• Ancient DNA from skeletons found at the site (2019 study).

• Ṛig Vedic and later texts on the Sarasvatī river, which give the textual background for the basin.

• In the news: The Union Budget of 2020 named Rakhigarhi among five archaeological sites to be developed as "iconic sites".

Don't confuse with

• Ganweriwala: the other Harappan city in the Sarasvatī basin. It lies in Cholistan, Pakistan, was found by Rafique Mughal in the late 1980s and covers more than 80 hectares [3]. Rakhigarhi is in Haryana, India.
• Kalibangan: also on the Ghaggar, but in Rajasthan (Hanumangarh district). It is famous for its ploughed field and fire altars, and ASI dug it from 1960 to 1969 [2]. Rakhigarhi is a bigger "city" in Haryana.
• Banawali: also in Haryana, but in Fatehabad district. It is a smaller settlement inside one enclosure wall with winding streets [3]. Rakhigarhi is in Hisar district and is one of the five major cities.
• Bhirrana / Farmana: smaller Haryana sites in the same basin. They are not counted among the five major Harappan cities.

Prelims Hooks

• Rakhigarhi is in Hisar district, Haryana, in the Ghaggar (Sarasvatī) basin.
• Of the five major Harappan cities, only Rakhigarhi and Ganweriwala lie in the Sarasvatī (Ghaggar-Hakra) basin. Mohenjodaro, Harappa and Dholavira lie outside it.
• Ghaggar (India) and Hakra (Pakistan) are the same dried channel, identified with the Ṛig Vedic Sarasvatī.
• Rakhigarhi is only partly excavated but is judged comparable in size to Harappa and Mohenjodaro [3].
• 2019 ancient DNA study (Vasant Shinde): a Harappan individual from Rakhigarhi showed no steppe ancestry.
• Trap: "Rakhigarhi is in Rajasthan." Wrong. Kalibangan is in Rajasthan; Rakhigarhi is in Haryana.

Mains Points

• Geographic spread: Rakhigarhi, with Ganweriwala, Kalibangan, Banawali and Farmana, shows that the Harappan Civilisation was not limited to the Indus valley. This is the main argument for calling it the "Sindhu-Sarasvatī Civilisation".
• Decline and shift: As the Ghaggar-Hakra (Sarasvatī) slowly lost its all-year flow, settlement probably moved east towards the Ganga-Yamuna doab. Rakhigarhi's Haryana location makes it a key site for studying how the civilisation changed after its mature phase.
• Debates on origins: The 2019 Rakhigarhi DNA study, together with the identification of the Ghaggar with the Ṛig Vedic Sarasvatī, is used in debates on how the Harappans and the Vedic people were linked and in what order they came. A good answer should present these as contested readings, not settled conclusions.

Related concepts

• Sarasvati river
• Sarasvati river basin
• Ganweriwala
• Kalibangan
• Banawali

Read more

• The Sarasvatī / Ghaggar-Hakra question