What lies beneath Keeladi: The uneasy politics of India’s past

Since its discovery in 2014, the Keeladi excavation near Madurai has emerged as one of India’s most contested archaeological sites – celebrated by some as evidence of an early urban civilisation in South India, and dismissed by others as an exercise in political mythmaking. In her latest book, The Dig: Keeladi and the Politics of India’s Past, journalist Sowmiya Ashok traces the accidental unearthing of this ancient settlement and the political storm that followed. Her journey moves across India’s archaeological landscape – from early Iron Age sites in Tamil Nadu to the Harappan site of Rakhigarhi in Haryana, and the lost port of Muziris in Kerala. Along the way, she speaks with archaeologists while enduring the blazing heat, clings to precarious platforms at a roaring jallikattu arena, and even samples fragments of ancient pottery at an excavation site. Sowmiya Ashok speaks to Kulasegaram Sanchayan about The Dig.

The Dig Credit: Sowmiya Ashok

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