Excerpts from Mahroks: The Story of the Kambojas, Sikhs and Shaheeds

The Kamboja people are very ancient and historic people of the famous Indo-Aryan race. They are now very numerous in the plains of East and West Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, other parts of India, around the mountains of Hindukush, the northeastern parts of Afghanistan, including its Badakhshan province, and modern Tajikistan across the Amu Darya (River Oxus), as well as in the southeastern parts of Iran.

The ancient Kamboja tribe was a famous Aryan tribe whose descendants we find in the Kamboja of today’s northern Indian subcontinent. Scholars opine that the Kamboj community of Punjab is related to the ancient Kamboja country, which was in the Hindukush mountain system and its adjoining areas. This land was noted in ancient literature for its fine breed of horses. Also called Kambohs, a farming community of Punjab, they are the modern descendants of the ancient Kambojas. The Kamboja people are the only Vedic Kshatriya people among the numerous Kshatriya tribes that participated in the great Mahabharata war. They have been especially glorified in the Mahabharata epic as the Vedic scholars (Kritvidiashach), besides being designated as the fiercest and swiftest of fighters, deadly warriors, wondrously armed braves, war intoxicated, death personified, dreadful as Yama, the God of Death, elephants gone wild/mad, as deadly as cobras, expert archers, expert cavaliers and expert mal-yudh-kushlah.

 Surprisingly, and by the twists of time and history, this once extremely famous and powerful, warlike and scholarly class of royal and proud Indo-Aryan people of ancient India and Iran are today by all accounts and reckonings little-known people. These famous Vedic and Avestan Aryan people of a bygone era once ruled supreme in southwest Asia. They dictated terms, for sure, and spoke and acted from positions of strength, as is amply and repeatedly evidenced by numerous and copious ancient literature and epigraphic inscriptions in India, Persia and the writings of classical Sanskrit and Greek historians. According to authentic and dedicated researchers at Delhi University, ‘undoubtedly, every inch of the Afghan soil stands trampled under the hooves of the world-famous Kamboja horses of the war-expert Kamboja cavalry’.

Jewan Deepak, the author, is multi-faceted. An aviator, an IT specialist, a trained classical musician, a linguist (with specialisation in Russian), a historian, and most importantly, a writer.

Excerpts from Mahroks: The Story of the Kambojas, Sikhs and Shaheeds

The Kamboja people are very ancient and historic people of the famous Indo-Aryan race. They are now very numerous in the plains of East and West Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, other parts of India, around the mountains of Hindukush, the northeastern parts of Afghanistan, including its Badakhshan province, and modern Tajikistan across the Amu Darya (River Oxus), as well as in the southeastern parts of Iran.

The ancient Kamboja tribe was a famous Aryan tribe whose descendants we find in the Kamboja of today’s northern Indian subcontinent. Scholars opine that the Kamboj community of Punjab is related to the ancient Kamboja country, which was in the Hindukush mountain system and its adjoining areas. This land was noted in ancient literature for its fine breed of horses. Also called Kambohs, a farming community of Punjab, they are the modern descendants of the ancient Kambojas. The Kamboja people are the only Vedic Kshatriya people among the numerous Kshatriya tribes that participated in the great Mahabharata war. They have been especially glorified in the Mahabharata epic as the Vedic scholars (Kritvidiashach), besides being designated as the fiercest and swiftest of fighters, deadly warriors, wondrously armed braves, war intoxicated, death personified, dreadful as Yama, the God of Death, elephants gone wild/mad, as deadly as cobras, expert archers, expert cavaliers and expert mal-yudh-kushlah.

 Surprisingly, and by the twists of time and history, this once extremely famous and powerful, warlike and scholarly class of royal and proud Indo-Aryan people of ancient India and Iran are today by all accounts and reckonings little-known people. These famous Vedic and Avestan Aryan people of a bygone era once ruled supreme in southwest Asia. They dictated terms, for sure, and spoke and acted from positions of strength, as is amply and repeatedly evidenced by numerous and copious ancient literature and epigraphic inscriptions in India, Persia and the writings of classical Sanskrit and Greek historians. According to authentic and dedicated researchers at Delhi University, ‘undoubtedly, every inch of the Afghan soil stands trampled under the hooves of the world-famous Kamboja horses of the war-expert Kamboja cavalry’.

Jewan Deepak, the author, is multi-faceted. An aviator, an IT specialist, a trained classical musician, a linguist (with specialisation in Russian), a historian, and most importantly, a writer.