Michel Danino

Michel Danino (born June 4, 1956) is an Indian author, originally from France.
He participated in the translation and publication of the works of Sri Aurobindo and of The Mother. Danino also edited India's Rebirth (a selection from Sri Aurobindo's works about India, first published in 1993) and India the Mother (a selection from the Mother's works about India). He engaged himself also for the preservation of tropical rainforest in the Nilgiri Hills. In 2001, he convened the International Forum for India's Heritage (IFIH) with the mission of promoting the essential values of India's heritage in every field of life.
At present, he's a guest professor at IIT Gandhinagar and a member of the Indian Council of Historical Research. On 25th January 2017, Government of India announced "Padma Shri" award for his contribution towards Literature & Education.

Birth and early life

Michel Danino was born in 1956 at Honfleur (France) into a family which had emigrated from Morocco. He was attracted to India from an early age. Yogis of India, Sri Aurobindo and The Mother particularly attracted him. In 1977, dissatisfied after four years of higher scientific studies, he left France for India, where he has since been living.

In The Invasion that Never Was (2000), he criticized the "Aryan invasion theory" and its proponents, instead opting for the notion of "Indigenous Aryans". Danino asserts that Aryans are indigenous to India. Danino is a guest professor at IIT Gandhinagar, where he is assisting the setting up of an Archaeological Sciences Centre.

Life in India

He spent a few years in Auroville, Tamil Nadu. Later, he lived in the Nilgiri mountains for two decades. In 2003 he settled near Coimbatore and adopted Indian citizenship.

While in the Nilgiris he fought against the daily destruction of Shola or evergreen montane rainforests of the Western Ghats and turned into a nature conservationist. His work prompted the Tamil Nadu Forest Department in 1998 to invite a committee of local citizens to assist in protecting Longwood Shola near Kotagiri. He said about the incident, "It shows that public's participation is the key and that the government alone, even when it has goodwill, is simply not geared to face today's challenges, but it is important that people get involved.".

Works

• Sri Aurobindo and Indian Civilization (1999)
• The Invasion that Never Was (2000)
• The Indian Mind Then and Now (2000)
• Is Indian Culture Obsolete? (2000)
• Kali Yuga or the Age of Confusion (2001)
• L'Inde et l'invasion de nulle part: le dernier repaire du mythe aryen (2006) Les Belles Lettres. ISBN 2-251-72010-3
• Indian Culture and India's Future (DK Printworld, 2011)

The Lost River: On The Trail of the Sarasvati

The Lost River: On The Trail of the Sarasvati, published in 2010, presents numerous arguments from topographic exploration, geological and climatological studies, satellite imagery, and isotope analyses, to support the view that the dried up riverbed of the Ghaggar-Hakra was the legendary Sarasvati River mentioned in Rigveda. The Ghaggar-Hakra river once sustained the great Indus Valley Civilization, which flourished between 3500 and 1900 BC.