To further explore early Harappan culture at Kunal, one of the earliest Harappan sites in Haryana, the State Government and Indian Archaeological Society, New Delhi will sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to have a new insight in early Harappan culture.
“The MoU will be signed on February 28. Kunal is located in tehsil Ratia of district Fatehabad,” said Haryana Archaeology and Museums Minister Ram Bilas Sharma.
He said that the excavation at this site was first conducted by late JS Khatri and M Acharya under Haryana State Archaeology Department during the year 1985-86. The previous excavations have provided significant traits of early Harappan culture in our sub continent for the very first time in the history of Harappan studies, said he.
The Minister said that the new project has been initiated to bring out the earliest material culture of the site, where the core area of the settlement is three-four acres but the site expands to nine acres.
He said that Kunal has a great contribution in the early Harappan studies in Indian sub continent and will definitely open new prospects in future researches on formation and antecedent stages of classical Harappans.
The developed drainage system characterizes this site. This excavation is aimed at bringing out the earliest material culture of the site and may push the history of the civilization back by over a thousand years, said he.
Kunal is located on the bank of now dried up river course of ancient mighty river Saraswati. This early Harappan time (3500-2500 BC) that is Period-I is divided by Period-IA (3500-2850 BC), Period-IB (2850-2600 BC) and Period-IC (2600-2500 BC) which is followed by Mature Harappan Period 11 (2500-1900 BC).
Hence, the Kunal excavations will provide us with a large number of new insights of early Harappan culture, the Minister added.
Notably, the excavation work at Rakhigarhi had got a major breakthrough last year with the recovery of around 15 human skeletons. Initial findings from the Rakhigarhi excavation site in Haryana's Hisar district -the biggest Harappan site – had indicated that it may be the oldest continuous living habitat in the world.