Many tribes of Afghanistan today are traced back to the Vedic period.
They participated in the famous Ten kings war of the Rig Veda lore. The
name of the nation itself is rooted in the ancient Indian literature.
The sixth century Indian astronomer Varaha Mihira in Brhat Samhita
refers about a people belonging to avagaana. This word became Avagana
and later became Afghan. Modern Afghanistatan was known as
ava(pa)gaana(m) in ancient times. This is known derivation of the place
name Afghanisthan. The following is another probability on this matter.
Rainy season is khanaagamam/ khanakaalam. The cloud season is
khanasamayam. A dark cloud is khanasyaamam. A cluster of clouds is
khanakhata. Khanambu is rainwater. From this word formation we can
understand ghanam is synonymous with cloud. Failure of rain, drought is
Ava(pa)gaaham. Avakhattam/ avatakacchapam. A hole, cavity, well avatam.
A hole in the ground, a well is ava avatu(ti). Avaghattam is a ditch. A
deep ditch is avakhaatam. Ava(pa) is a prefix in Sanskrit to denote
devoid of. The ‘va' in the prefix ‘ava' is transformed and became apa.
The state of being cloudlessness is apakhana. A reservoir like pond,
lake, etc is jalasthaanam. But the word apakhana becomes a synonym of
destitution when applied to denote the name of a nation. What is lacking
in Afghanistan is fertile land and females. So the demand for both
fertile land and females is great. What is not lacking and found in
abundance is cloudless, clear, blue sky. Hence, those who are aware of
the importance of destitution might have named the nation as
Apakhanasthaan, which later came to be known as Afghanistan.
Qarez
China doesn’t have Qanat technology. But it has an oases town named
Turfan. Qanat is locally known as qarez. Qanat technicians brought from
Persia were the architects of Qanat, which came into being in the 18th
century. Eastern most is the one found in Turfan and on the western side
found on the southern Spain is the Qanat that the Moores built, at a
later period. In Malayalam Dictionaries the word Qarez occurs to mean
spring fountain. Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Afghanistan, Russia, Sinkiang
province of China, in sum, the Qanat spread all over Asia like a vein
has a single mission, to turn the desert into an oases. That might have
begun from a single Qanat.
Wadi
The land on the top of the mountain is adhithyaka and the low land is
upathyaka. River valley turns splendid with plenty of vegetation and it
becomes a wadi. Land at the foot of the mountain valley is vale or a
valley is wadi. With granite at the bottom and gravel, coarse sand and
silt above is the peculiarity of the low land or river valley. At the
bottom of this wadi water accumulates after rainfall or through higher
water table that percolates water to the lower levels of wadi. The
Arabic wadi is a watercourse canyon, which is dry, except during the
rainy season. Canyon is kantaram in Sanskrit. It means a glen, a
small-secluded valley. A valley is a depression of the earth’s surface,
through which a stream flows.
In India
We have seen that Qanats are underground tunnels, with a canal in the
floor of the tunnel, to carry water. Between the source of water and its
destination, at regular intervals, well-like openings extend from the
surface to the tunnel floor. Through these openings the tunnels were
built and on its completion it is retained to maintain tunnel. The
underground nature of the canal reduces evaporation in the hot and windy
desert. Qanats originate in highlands, with a mother shaft, the deepest
among them being 400 meters below ground. The tunnel floor slopes at a
gentle angle toward its destination, miles and miles away. The Qanat can
get water from an underground aquifer. As such a surface river or stream
is not needed. The Qanat tunnel becomes humidified by the water, then
further evaporation of water ceases. Since it travels at a slope
independent of the surface features, it can go in a straight line. The
water-carrying canal in Qanat is usually lined with stone or tile to
reduce water loss.
Unlike the desert, the Qanat like structures are not required at India
on large scale. But they are found random in some places. One introduced
during the Mughal period and another at Kasaragod whose origin is
uncertain.
Khooni bhandara
Khooni bhandara is a unique underground water management system built in
1615 at Burhanpur city, in Madhya Pradesh, by Tabkutul Arj, a Persian
geologist, to meet the water demand of the Mughal army. Its mysterious
system of tunnels brings water from nearby catchment areas and supplies
clean and adequate drinking water all the year round. Burhanpur, the
base for the expansion of Mughals in south India, was situated on the
river banks of the Tapti and Utavali. Khooni bhandara consist of 103
kundis (well -like storage structures) constructed in a row. They are
interconnected to each other through a 3.9 km long underground marble
tunnel. This system would check the flow of rainwater from the Satpura
hills flowing towards the river Tapti. The design is based on the simple
law of gravity.
Surangam
Surangam is a man-made horizontal tunnel pierced deep into the water
bearing rock in the hard laterite formations, until sumptuous water is
struck. Its width is about 0.45-0.70 metres (m) and height about 1.8-2.0
m. But the length of the tunnel varies from 3 to 300 m. Ground water
pattern changes with the passage of time. But the availability of water
depends on the season as well as on the peculiarities of the earth. All
these affect the seepage inside the surangam. This situation is managed
by opening fresh areas to intercept the natural flow of groundwater.
Several subsidiary surangam make the tunnels lengthy. Those tunnels with
100 mts or more in length are provided with a number of vertical
airshafts to facilitate air circulation as well as to regulate
atmospheric pressure inside the tunnel. This helps the movement of the
people inside the tunnel for the purpose of maintenance. The distance
between successive vertical airshafts with a dimension of 2 m by 2 m,
varies between 50-60 m. Its depth also varies from place to place. All
these factors set the pace of excavating surangam and take generations
to complete. The tunnel collects water that seeps out from the hard rock
and flows out to an open pit and to then carried forward by means of a
pipe for onward transmission to the desired destination. It is a mine;
no doubt it is a mineral water source too. Many such surangam have been
made by private landowners irrigate a considerable area in Kasaragod
district. It is noticed that the hillocks of Kavvayi watershed region
has no surangam.
Laterite as Building Material
The laterite soil peculiar to this region ensures that the tunnel does
not collapse while drilling. The Latin word for brick is later.
Lateritis is brick stone. Webster’s Dictionary defines Laterite as a
residual product of rock decay that is red in colour and has a high
content in the oxides of iron and hydroxide of aluminum. Dr Francis
Hamilton Buchanan (1807), a medical officer of the East India Company,
who conducted studies in and around Angadipuram in Malappuram district
in 1800 AD, called this porous rock material laterite. He speaks about
Laterite as “—nearly devoid of bases and primary silicates and commonly
found with quartz and kaolin and developed in tropical or warm temperate
climatic regions. It is capable of hardening after the treatment of
wetting and drying and can be cut and used for bricks, and is brick red
in colour”.
The red/ brown laterite stone, rich in iron, is found in many tropical
regions like India, Sri Lanka, Burma, Central and West Africa and
Central America. Red laterite stone, a cost- effective, local material
is easy to quarry and dress. In Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts and
the mainland areas of Kerala laterite is a local material used in
constructing buildings and gives an enticing look, to the building.
Even before the British ‘discovered’ laterite, it was profusely in use
as a building material in Kerala, as is evident from the still existing
illam, mana and ancient temples in Kasargod and Kannur built centuries
ago. Carvings, as well as sculptures, made out of this material are
marvellous. The laterite is known as chhekkallu. “Chhekkallinl
kothalangalum thherthu” Chhekkallu in this citation, also known as
chengallu/ vettukallu in Malayalam, (moorakallu in Karnataka) is the
laterite block used as a building material in Kerala for centuries.
Laterite monuments include the Bekal Fort, laterite wall enclosures of
Gajaprishtam temple, Tippu's fort in Tellicherry, Fort St Angelo in
Kannur (in Kerala), the Basilica of Bom Jesus ( Goa) etc.
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Surangam is a man-made horizontal tunnel pierced deep into the water
bearing rock in the hard laterite formations, until sumptuous water is
struck. Its width is about 0.45-0.70 metres (m) and height about 1.8-2.0
m. But the length of the tunnel varies from 3 to 300 m. Ground water
pattern changes with the passage of time. But the availability of water
depends on the season as well as on the peculiarities of the earth. All
these affect the seepage inside the surangam. This situation is managed
by opening fresh areas to intercept the natural flow of groundwater.
Several subsidiary surangam make the tunnels lengthy. Those tunnels with
100 mts or more in length are provided with a number of vertical
airshafts to facilitate air circulation as well as to regulate
atmospheric pressure inside the tunnel. This helps the movement of the
people inside the tunnel for the purpose of maintenance. The distance
between successive vertical airshafts with a dimension of 2 m by 2 m,
varies between 50-60 m. Its depth also varies from place to place. All
these factors set the pace of excavating surangam and take generations
to complete. The tunnel collects water that seeps out from the hard rock
and flows out to an open pit and to then carried forward by means of a
pipe for onward transmission to the desired destination. It is a mine;
no doubt it is a mineral water source too. Many such surangam have been
made by private landowners irrigate a considerable area in Kasaragod
district. It is noticed that the hillocks of Kavvayi watershed region
has no surangam.
