Muni Kumudendu, a great genius, created a unique treasure house of knowledge known as ‘Siri Bhoovalaya’ about a thousand years ago in Karnataka, India. The unique feature of this literature is that it is scripted in numerals only and enciphered in such manner that deciphering could be done in different fashions which result in plain-texts in different languages. One page of this epic corresponds to one ‘Chakra’. A scheme for deciphering of Chakra is termed as ‘Bandha’. Only 1270 of Chakras available this day. A Chakra is a 27x27 matrix of integers in range from 1 to 64 only. Each of the Integers is associated or encoded with a phonetic character primarily of origin in Kannada Language. Deciphering of a Chakra in specific manners or applying corresponding Bandhas reveals poetry and verses in different languages. In addition to primarily in Kannada, the languages in which the Chakras manifest poetry and verses include Prakrita, Sanskrit, Telugu, Tamil, Apabhramsha and Pali etc.. It is considered that this wonderful design contains verses in 18 major languages and 700 minor one thus totaling 718 of dialects. The subject matter covers religious scriptures of Jains, Vedas, Ayurveda, Astrology and Mathematics too. This unique piece of literature could not attract attention of masses because it is scripted in numerals and decipherment is a very tedious job. This led to loss of not only the original manuscript of this precious work but also of five of the copies during the course of time. After this being laid dormant for about thousand years, great efforts of Pandit Yellappa Shastri brought it to light with the only available copy of it in existence. We all owe sincere gratitude to Pandit Yellappa Shastri for protecting and revealing this magnificent heritage. Sizeable content of this composition has not come to light due to difficulty in deciphering the schemes in respective Chakras.
The objective of this presentation is to illustrate some of the decipherment schemes which are deployed on Chakras to reveal plain-text. These schemes are labeled as Bandhas by Muni Kumudendu and he himself has described many of these Bandhas with associated nomenclature. It is remarkable to note that Bandhas implement many of Cryptographic algorithms, which have contemporary relevance and those were envisioned by Muni Kumudendu thousand years ago. These algorithms largely include substitution, transposition or permutation, and principles of Steganography etc. It may be another subject of investigation that how could Muni Kumudendu accomplish this unique highly complicated and complex mission which not only involved mathematical brilliance but also dexterity to put in great literature and enormous knowledge in it.
On National Teacher Day, meet the 2024-25 Kenan Fellows
An inimitable cryptographic creation : Siri Bhoovalaya
1. An Inimitable Cryptographic
Creation: Siri Bhoovalaya
by
Anil Kumar Jain, SMIEEE, FIETE,
FIE(I),SMCSI, LMISCA
email: ak.jain@ieee.org
web-site: www.siri-bhoovalaya.org
2. Agenda of this Presentation
• Siri Bhoovalaya – historic perspective
• Basic Elements of Siri Bhoovalaya
• Multilingual Phonetic Alphabet Encoding
Scheme
• Deciphering Schemes or Bandhas
• Steganography (Chitra Bandha) example
• Conclusion
3. Siri Bhoovalaya : A Historic Perspective
• Created by Muni Kumudendu about a thousand year
ago in Karnataka.
• Muni Kumudendu was a Jain saint in lineage of Deshi
Gana / Nandi Sangh.
• About thousand years after its creation it was
rediscovered about sixty years ago by Pandit Yellappa
Shashtri through his determined and untiring efforts
from the only available copy of the manuscript.
• Its contents are primarily in Kannada, but in addition
the languages in which the Chakras manifest poetry
and verses include Prakrita, Samskrit, Telugu, Tamil,
Apabhramsha and Pali etc. totaling 718 of dialects.
4. Basic Elements of Siri Bhoovalaya
• Chakra : One Chakra is arrangement of numbers (in range 1 to
64) in a matrix of 27 rows and 27 columns. There are only
1270 Chakras available and are classified into 56 Chapters.
• Bandha : A Bandha is manner in which contents from a
Chakra is revealed. Bandha basically describes the method to
traverse the 27x27 matrix and substitute respective numbers
into letters to uncover the Shlokas or verses hidden therein
the Chakra. There are many Bandhas which are identified as
Chakra-Bandha, Navmaank-Bandh, Shreni-Bandha, Hans-
Bandha, Anu-Bandha, Mayur-Bandha, Saras-Bandha, Padma-
Bandha etc. etc.
• Kumudendu Code Table: This table is used for substituting
Numerals in all the Chakras into corresponding Phonetic
Aplhabet Characters . Some of the characters don’t find usage
in contemporary scenario and some find usage in specific
languages as well.
10. Applying Substitution using Kumudendu
Code Table
(Mono-alphabetic Substitution Cipher)
Result after applying Chakra-Bandh (Transpose
Cipher) – from previous slide :
11. Output from Chakra Bandha Applied to
first Chakra of Siri Bhoovalaya
Resultant text after conjoining phonetic alphabets :
12. Steganography (Chitra Bandha)
example
In Steganography the intended message is hidden
either to conceal its existence or render it unintelligible
to outsiders. In following example a graphical figure is
used as key to extract the hidden message.
13. Superimposing the figure on Chakra at
defined position to reveal content in those
particular cells in manner as shown
14. Result of Chitra-Bandha
Create string of numbers from the Superimposed Chakra’s cells
in the same order as marked on the Chitra-Bandha. Then apply
Mono-alphabetic Substitution Cipher as shown in the table
below:
15. Conclusion
Siri Bhoovalaya is still a largely un-explored terrain & a creative Multidisciplinary
Approach is required to open up new pages of knowledge. The measures includes:
1. Computerization for Deciphering known Number Patterns (Bandhas) hidden in
Chakras (Algorithmic and Non Algorithmic)
2. Computerization for Discovery of new and yet unexplored Bandhas.
3. Specialist Linguists to apprehend content in respective languages
4. Domain Knowledge Experts to interpret the text.
A Great Question which still remains to be answered :
How could Muni Kumudendu accomplished it about a
thousand year ago ??