Vaimanika Shastra – Vymaanika-shaastra

Subbaraya Shastry

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ShrutSangam GyanBhandars JainTatvaGyanshala

Vaimanika Shastra or Vymaanika-shaastra is a very strange illustrated book about ancient flying machines from Hindu India. While everything seems to be debunked and even the author admits that the entire content is based upon dreamlike visions, the content is widely used to ignite theories about a golden ancient era in India where people build flying machines. The book was written and drawn in the early 20th-century by Subbaraya Shastry, a mystic from Anekal. He was en extraordinary man of great knowledge and he was known for his ability to speak in tongues or verses whenever he got inspired. The entire content of the Vaimānika Shāstra was thus spoken to his friend G. Venkatachala Sharma who transcribed it exactly as spoken in Sanskrit. After some years the text was published in Hindi in 1959 and later in English with the title Vymanika Shastra. The later is the version presented here. The book is extremely detailed in the description of the technology behind aircraft, the metals used, assembly of planes and the theory of using planes in the war. The reason for the claims that this book might reveal ancient secrets lies in the fact that the author points out that the Vimanas, mythological castles and wagons mentioned in a number of Jain scriptures, where actual flying machines. Some even believe that the Rigveda and the Ramayanas mention of Vimanas really refer to actual flying machines. From time to time the idea that airplanes from ancient India pops up. The theories are that they could fly not only all over the globe but even to other planets. On one occasion, at the 102nd Indian Science Congress held at the Mumbai University in January 2015, Ameya Jadhav, who holds in an M.A. in Sanskrit as well as an M.Tech. degree declared that “In those days, airplanes were huge in size, and could move left, right, as well as backward, unlike modern planes which only fly forward.” This caused quite a stir, and NASA-representatives demanded Jadhavs talk be canceled because of the obvious element of pseudoscience. Read more