Floating stones found in Rameshwaram

May 28, 2004

Saturday, 29 May , 2004, 01:21

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Do stones float in water? The answer would be a certain no.

But in the island of Rameshwaram in Tamil Nadu, stones, it seems, do

float in water.

Difficult to believe-but it's a reality.

Floating stones of Rameshwaram have a mythological twist to it.

According to the Hindu mythological epic Ramayana, which was

supposed to have taken place over 17 million years ago, Lord Rama

and his army of monkeys used stones to build a bridge across the

Palk Strait to link Rameshwaram to Sri Lanka.

Legend as well as archaeological findings indicate the first signs

of human inhabitation in Sri Lanka date back to the primitive age

and it is assumed that the bridge's age is also almost equivalent.

G. Mohan Das, a local historian and caretaker of the stones in the

temple, said that these stones could have been the kind used to

build the mythological bridge.

"The history of these floating stones is that when Lord Rama made a

bridge to trek to Lanka to bring back his consort Sita, these were

the same stones used. But today's educated people do not agree to

it. They believe it is a coral that is found in Australia, in small

islands. We believe there is no difference in these stones. Both the

stones do not have air in them. The composition is the same and it

has 40 kinds of chemicals," he said.

Space images taken by NASA reveal a series of rock outcrops in the

Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka. Some historians say these

could be the part of the mythological bridge linking Indian

peninsula with Sri Lanka island.

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