6_Glorious_Epochs_of_Indian_History

1ST GLORIOUS EPOCH 53
with extending the boundaries of their empire up to the
banks of the Indus only, they had vowed to establish the
Bharatiya empire over the whole of India and to annihilate
the unruly Mlenchchas ! At that time the (north western),
frontier of India did not rest with the eastern bank of the
Indus. But it reached much farther beyond the Indus so as
to include among its fold the regions like the Gandhar and
the rivers now lost to Afghanisthan, but once well-known to
Vedic Aryans, like the Kubha (the Kabul of today) the Kramu
(the Kurram of today), the Suwastu (the Swat of today), the
Gomati (the Gumal of today) and others, right up to the
peaks of the Hindukush mountains^o". To that far end
were spread our repubhcs following the Vedic religion and
born of a Bharatiya race ! And over these regions had been
ruling the traditional royal dynasties of India. As our
people in that ice-cold regions were comparatively whiter it
was also called by some "White India"^"^. Naturally the
national aspiration, as embodied in Chandragupta-Chanakya
scheme of things, fortified its imperial boundaries not only
up to the eastern bank of the Indus with a strong army, but
it also busied itself with the planning and preparation and
execution of the extension of the imperial boundaries right
up to the natural geographic frontiers of India, the Hindukush
mountain, and yearned to hoist its flag on the top of that
mountain.
sages."
"These also laboured in the cause espoused by the other
GREEK FEUDS AND THE DIVISION OF THE EMPJLRE
128. In the meanwhile, the Greek civil feuds had tem­
porarily ceased by dividing Alexander's empire, ceding its
vast portion from the Indian frontiers up to Babylon to
Seleucos Nicator, one of the bravest and most experienced
veteran of Alexander's military ofiicers, who ruled it as an
independent sovereign^"*. He was supposed to inherit the