As noted in the posting dated May 20, 2012 (The Mystery of the Age of Humanity: Still Unsolved), Prof. C. A. Shinde (Librarian of the Adyar Library) kindly informed me that although the Adyar library does not have the particular issue that H. P. Blavatsky used, for kali yuga 4986 or 1884-1885 C.E., it does have several previous years of the Tirukkanda Panchanga, 1870-1881. This was wonderful news, since any one of these should give the epochs used in this long-defunct almanac, and that HPB used in The Secret Doctrine (vol. 2, pp. 68-69). I then requested the help of Dr. N. C. Ramanujachary with this, who has taken out time from his full schedule to carefully check the 1880-1881 issue and to write up a detailed reply. His extremely helpful reply has elucidated and clarified much for us. I have received his permission to post it here. It is dated July 15, 2012. He wrote:
“I am sorry for the delay but it was unavoidable because of my tours and non-availability of time.
But I am glad I was able to do some useful work on the way that was puzzling you, with the kind help of Prof. C A Shinde, the Librarian of the Adyar Library.
I will place the points in numbers:
- The Adyar Library has not got the said Panchangam for 1884-5, but luckily they have the number for 1880-81. By adding 4 years to the figures available in this, we get the actual years for 1884-5, I am sure you will agree.
- The name of the Panchanga is actually “Tiru (=Sri) Ganita (=mathematical) Panchangam” in Tamil and “Drik-Ganita-Panchangamu” in Telugu. Evidently the person who informed HPB of the names did not spell it well or the variation in pronunciation made it ‘Tirukkanda Panchangam’ – which is obviously wrong. The Panchangam is printed by ‘Vyavahara Tarangini Mudrakshara Sala’ at Chennapuri (=Madras). The compilers of the Panchangam are: Chintamani Raghunathacharyulu and Tadakamalla Venkata Krishna Rao living in Nungumbakkam and Triplicane (both are part-wards of Madras City). You will find the names of compilers were also defectively noted in The Secret Doctrine, as also all other records of literature derived from that.
- This Panchangam is published year after year in Tamil (Dravid) and Telugu. Happily as I know Telugu, I was able to fish out the material you wanted.
- I am holding photo-copies (2) of the title page and the Inner page where the figures are enumerated, given kindly by the Adyar Library; and will be able to post them by Air Mail if you can send me the Postal address, which I do not have now. If you need exact English translation of the pages, I can also give it.
- Now, coming to the figure/number part:
Calendar for the Vikrama year (1880-81)
According to Sri Surya Siddhanta :
Years that passed since Brahman-kalpa: 1972948980
Years that passed since Creation (Srishti) 1955884981
Years that passed since SWAYAMBHAVA Manu 16645009981
Years that passed in Vaivaswata Manu 18618721
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Years that passed in Kaliyuga 4982
Years that passed in Vikrama Satabda 1938
Years that passed in Salivahana Saka 1803
KOLLAMANDU 1054-55
ENGLISH 1880-81
HIZARI 1297-98
PHASALI 1289-90
YEARS THAT THIS PANCHANGA WAS SINCE PUBLISHED 12
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MY NOTE [Dr. Ramanujachary]: The years in between the 2 border lines do not concern us now.
When you add 4 years (duration between 1880-81 & 84-85) to the years that passed in Vaivaswata Manu, we get the figure 18,618,725, which was adopted by HPB. Please also note the Tiru Ganita Panchangam clearly says the figures are according to SURYA SIDDHANTA.”
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Dr. Ramanujachary then had scans of the relevant pages made and sent to me. They are here attached, so that anyone can see these things for themselves: tiruganitapanchangam.
First, we see that the title Tirukkanda Panchanga is incorrectly written. Using a phonetic spelling like HPB used, it is the Tiru Ganita Panchanga, following the Tamil, or the Drik Ganita Panchanga, following the Telugu. It is in fact the Dṛg-gaṇita Pañcāṅga, described in Sankar Balakrishna Dikshit’s book, Bharatiya Jyotish Sastra (references and link given at the end of the posting on the Tirukkanda Panchanga dated May 30).
Next, we see that there is indeed a typographical or clerical error in the figure 1,955,884,687 years given in The Secret Doctrine, vol. 2, p. 68, which should be 1,955,884,987. This was deduced by Hans Malmstedt in his 1933 article, as reported by David Pratt (references and links given in the April 29, 2012 posting, Occult Chronology: The Age of the World, part 2). The figure 1,664,500,987 years given in The Secret Doctrine is also confirmed (see HPB’s footnote on this, vol. 2, p. 68), showing that Malmstedt has again provided the correct solution to this problem.
Last and most important, the figure for the age of the Vaivasvata manvantara, given in The Secret Doctrine as 18,618,728 years (vol. 2, p. 69), is confirmed as being correctly copied from the Tiru Ganita Panchanga. It is not a mistaken transcription, as I suggested may have been the case in my posting dated May 30, 2012. This puts us on firm ground to proceed with our investigation. We now have to determine how this figure was arrived at, based on information given in the Sūrya-siddhānta. Everyone else gets a figure of about 120 million years for the age of the Vaivasvata manvantara based on this data. It is possible that the compilers of the Tiru Ganita Panchanga had access to a more complete copy of the Sūrya-siddhānta. As stated in the posting on the Sūrya-siddhānta, dated May 15, 2012, manuscripts of this text vary widely. Most of the Sanskrit commentaries on it remain unpublished. The Indian astronomers who produced the Tiru Ganita Panchanga somehow got a figure of 18 million years for this. As Dr. Ramanujachary confirmed, in agreement with what HPB reported (SD 2.49-51), “the Tiru Ganita Panchangam clearly says the figures are according to SURYA SIDDHANTA.”