Could These Be the Ruins of an Ancient Bridge Between India and Sri Lanka?

Hindu tradition has long held the belief that this strip of land between India and Sri Lanka was a bridge built by their beloved deity Rama as described in the Hindu epic the Ramayana. NASA satellite images suggest it may indeed be the remains of a constructed structure.

Located in the Palk Strait off the Southeastern edge of India is a chain of limestone shoals. A shoal or sandbar is characterized by a long and narrow strip of land typically composed of sand, silt and small pebbles that have been deposited over time.

This strip of land was once believed to be a natural formation, however, images taken by a NASA satellite gave way to speculations that this land formation could be a long broken bridge under the ocean’s surface. Now called “Adam’s Bridge”, it extends 48 km (30 mi) from mainland India to modern day Sri Lanka.

Some parts of the formation are dry and the sea in the area rarely exceeds 1 meter (3 ft) in depth, thus hindering navigation. It was reportedly passable on foot until the 15th century, when storms deepened the channel: temple records seem to say that Adam’s Bridge was completely above sea level until it broke in a cyclone in 1480.

But how did this incredible structure form? Dr. S. Badrinarayanan, the former director of the Geological Survey of India, and his team performed a survey of this structure and concluded that it was man-made.

They drilled 10 bore holes along the alignment of Adam’s Bridge. What they discovered was startling. About 6 meters below the surface they found a consistent layer of calcareous sand stone, corals and boulder-like material. The team was surprised when they also discovered a layer of loose sand, some 4-5 meters further down and then hard rock formations below that.

Based on a study of the core samples of the bridge the team concluded that we are not looking at a natural formation – as other scientists suggest – but a man-made structure, one that was ‘erected’ more than a million years ago.

Obviously, there are many who disagree with Dr. Badrinarayanan. One of them is Suvrat Kher, a geologist specializing in marine formations, who firmly believes the structure is nothing more than a natural formation.

Writing about the alleged bridge, Dr. Kher said: “During the Pleistocene ‘ice-age’ period, glacial buildup and melting forced fluctuations in sea-level by tens of meters, setting up the conditions for several episodes of coral reef and sand shoal formation. During periods of large sea-level drops in the Pleistocene, there would have been a land connection between India and Sri Lanka. But at the end of the last Wisconsin glaciation, the sea-level began to rise world-wide.”

Man-made, god-made, natural? What do you think?

Sources: 1, 2, 3