Indian tradition of Mathematics and Astronomy is most amazing and least recalled and seldom taught in India’s education system. Courtesy Macaulay missionary academia, which ensured great work is erased and forgotten systematically. How was this possible?

Gazing through the naked eye and through prolonged observation of nature and astronomical motion was the adopted methodology. Yes many would disagree. And It would certainly sound unbelievable to the generation who uses calculators for making small multiplication calculations.  

It is our failure that these discoveries of Number system, Hindu decimal system, planetary motion and the other endless scientific discoveries have not been summarized for our generations. Who made it possible? All this work has been documented in great ancient Language Sanskrit, whose grammar was conceptualized by Panini.

Panini (5th Century BC): – Sanskrit was a language in which all the narration of Hindu Sanatan Seers and Sages were documented. Panini, a great Scholar of Sanskrit codified this language. Unbelievable Panini!!! Born in Gandhara along the bank of the Indus River, he penned a marvel called “Astadhyayi”.  Medieval times, His legacies were systematically erased and no wonder the Bank of Indus sank into perennial brutality and violence thereafter.  Imagine the loss.

Aryabhata (5th Century AD): Author of the masterpiece on Astronomy Aryabhatiyam and Arya-siddhanta. Books par excellence for its invention and path breaking calculation. He explained for the first time about the rotation of Earth on its own axis.

His amazing example about “Just as a man in a boat moving forward sees the stationary objects (on either side of the river) as moving backwards has no match in the scientific world.”

Decimal system of numbers, the modern calculation are based upon the Great Aryabhata work on his invention of Zero and its position while doing computation.

Varahamihira (6th Century AD): – Amazing work about motion and planetary calculation. His book Brihat Samhita explains in detail about Earth being Spherical in Shape and its rotation along with its axis around the Sun. He further narrated the circumference of earth and the position of the two poles. North Poles and South Poles were identified and explained in detail.

He accurately estimated the circumference of the earth as 3200 yojanas. Furthermore, each Yojana is estimated to be 12-15 km, which translates into nearly 38,000 km to 45,000 km, which is almost accurate to the current estimates. Earth’s circumference is the distance around Earth and it is measured around the Equator, it is 40,075.017 km.

Brahmagupta, (7th Century AD.) another Great Astronomer measured the accurate circumference of earth and documented the same in his book Khandakhadyaka. Further his work still counts and reverberates in modern mathematics as Brahmagupta-Fibonacci identity, Brahmagupta’s interpolation formula, Brahmagupta’s formula.

Bhaskara first: – 7th Century AD. A mathematician who wrote commentary on Aryabhata work. He was a wizard in number and its computation. His Hindu decimal system, calculation with respect to angle and distance later on known as Sin X and pell equations were the greatest of contribution.  He also authored two books named as Mahabhaskariya and Labhubhaskariya.

Deva (8th Century AD), another less known and talked ancient astronomer, too had documented the accurate measurement of the Earth’s circumference. Importantly all these works by great ancient Scientists were done independently in different geography and time zones. He is further credited with having measured the distance between Ujjain (Madhya Pradesh) and Lanka (Sri Lanka). He documented it to be nearly 200 yojanas, approximately 3,000 km nearly accurate from present measurement.

Lalla: An 8th century AD, mathematician and astrologer documented his finding that the Earth travelled from west to east.  And if anyone viewed it from the north pole star Polaris, Earth turns left, i.e., counterclockwise. Lallas’s documentation on Earth’s rotation on its axis and the direction of its rotation is very important work.

The actual translation of Lalla Works is as explained “To (the gods) at the North Pole, it appears to move from the left to the right and (the demons) at the South Pole from the right to the left. Traditionally Indian astronomers identified the North Pole as habitation of Devta/ God and South Poles as habitation of Asur/ Demon.

Bhaskarcharya also known as Bhaskara II in 12th century AD: – The author of Siddhanta Siromani, another masterpiece on Astronomical calculation. His work on measuring circumference of the Earth documents it’s to be of 4967 yojana along with its diameter 1581. Bhaskara II employed the calculation using Angle distance, which later on frequently termed as trigonometry.

Makkibhatta (14th Century AD) was another marvel mathematician of contemporary India. His scholarly work is Ganitabhūsana, whose only few chapters survive today and is available in original form. And he too computed and narrated about Earth rotation on its own axis from west to east.

Nilakantha 15th Century AD from Kerala, another astronomer had in a separate study made an accurate measurement of the earth’s diameter is around 1050 yojans, i.e., 12,000 km. His contributions on trigonometric function and infinite series were exemplary.

Kamalakara (17th Century AD): Another great mathematician who lived in the city of Varanasi in the 17th Century AD, was first to write insightful details about earthquakes within the Earth Crust. His detailed work about the earth interiors and balance between temperature and density of earth interior had been an outstanding work. He documented his findings in his book titled Siddhanta Tattva Viveka.

And all this happened centuries ahead of Europeans having nascent ideas about Planetary Science.

This small article on the genius of Indian ancient work on astronomy and mathematics cannot encapsulate the wonder we had.

Do refer to a great compilation where over 3000 verses from different original work has been traced and compiled on this Subject.  Read the Sourcebook on Indian Astronomy, by BV Subbarayappa and KV Sarma for more comprehensive learning. 

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