CLASH OF THE CIVILISATION

Even as the discovery of the Indus Valley Civilisation completes a century, some key aspects of this ancient culture remain mysterious, including its script. While the controversy over whether it was disrupted by an Aryan invasion may now be discredited, the debate over Indus ancestry and current links continues

- PRATUL SHARMA

The most captivating piece of art from an Indus Valley civilisation site, the Dancing Girl, is a 4.1-inch bronze figurine of a slender young woman, with her head held high. Her unusually long left arm, adorned with 24-25 bangles, rests gracefully on her bent knee, while her right arm, with four bangles, is placed on her hip. Her hair is styled into a bun, and a simple bead pendant adorns her neck. The Dancing Girl, without any clothing, conveys a compelling narrative of grace and strength.

This diminutive statue, now housed in Delhi’s National Museum, has elicited countless interpretations by archaeologists, historians, artists and even poets, since her discovery at Mohenjo-daro by archaeologists Daya Ram Sahni and Ernest Mackay in 1926. Their superior, John Marshall, director-general of the Archaeological Survey of India, called her the Dancing Girl, a name that has endured. Some have suggested she might even be a warrior, as her left hand is coiled as though to hold something, perhaps a spear or a baton. Her broad nose and large lips led some to speculate that she may have been of Dravidian or even Baluchi descent.

Wrote Mortimer Wheeler, who served as director-general of the ASI between 1944 and 1948, "A girl perfectly of the moment, perfectly confident in herself and the world. There's nothing like her, I think, in ancient art. We may not be certain that she was a dancer, but she was good at what she did and she knew it." The author Mulk Raj Anand referred to her as Maya in his children's novel, and a clothed version of the statue was chosen as the mascot for the International Museum Expo 2023, held in Delhi.