"It is this critical study that led to the conclusion that there was no "Ramayana age" or a particular time in which the "Ramayana" was written. The Valmiki Ramayana continued to change and acquire new passages over a long period. Like Homer's epics Ramayana was composed floating oral legends and ballads which were given the shape of an epic by the genius of a great poet. There has never been historical evidence that the events narrated ever happened in reality.
But for the Hindu right, Ramayana rather than being a mythological poem becomes a fact whose history cannot be questioned
The supremacy of rational inquiry is a fundamental basis of all academic endeavors and undermining that destroys the basis of a university. If the logic of the criticism of Ramanujan's essay is extended, then historical studies will be transformed into theological works that discuss religion only from theological rather than secular standpoint".
Reference-
Ashwin Anshu, 2011. Economic and Political Weekly. No. 46. Ramakatha, Rambhakts and the University.
The writer is doctoral student in Delhi University working on the "Ramkatha and the Construction of Hindu Identity".
