Introduction

Indian civilisation, one of the oldest and most enduring cultures in human history, has made enormous contributions to the world's knowledge systems. For thousands of years, this civilisation flourished with amazing advancement in scientific, philosophical, medical, and artistic advancements that were unparalleled during their time.

Despite the incredible impact of these contributions to society, it is only in recent decades that modern scholars have begun to study and unravel the depth of knowledge embedded within ancient Indic texts and practices.

By acknowledging the advanced state of Indic knowledge systems, we can gain a deeper appreciation for the intellectual heritage that has shaped much of our modern world.

In this paper, I shall delve into one of such narratives and endeavour to unravel the information it seeks to impart.

The Facts

In the Bhagavata Purana, Vishnu Purana and Mahabharat; units of time specifically governing the life of Brahma are mentioned as follows:

There are four yugas: Satyuga, Dwaparyuga, Tretayuga, and Kalyuga. The timeline for Kalyuga is 432,000 years. Dwaparyuga is twice as long as Kalyuga, amounting to 864,000 years. Tretayuga is thrice as long as Kalyuga, totalling 1,296,000 years. Finally, Satyuga, the longest of all the yugas, is quadruple the length of Kalyuga, which is 1,728,000 years.

All four yugas together are called a Chaturyuga, totalling 4,320,000 years or 4.32 million years. Seventy-one such Chaturyugas form a Manvantara, spanning 306,720,000 years or 306.72 million years. Each Manvantara is preceded by a "Sandhya" period that lasts for a duration equivalent to Satyuga. Additionally, after the end of the last Manvantara, there is another "Sandhya" period of the same duration as Satyuga.

Thus, a total of 308,448,000 years elapse for 14 Manvantaras along with 14 Sandhyas.  The last “Sandhya” period after the last Manvantara along with 14 Manvantaras makes one Kalpa. A Kalpa comprises 14 Manvantaras and 15 Sandhis which is 4,320,000,000 years or 4.32 billion years. This duration constitutes one day (12 hours) of Brahma. The same time frame of 1 Kalpa constitutes one night of Brahma.

Thus, one day of Brahma is 8.64 billion solar years!

Analysis

According to the general theory of relativity, gravitational time dilation is a form of time dilation representing an actual difference in elapsed time between two events as measured by observers situated at varying distances from a gravitating mass.

This means that if two people are situated on two different planets (both planets vary greatly in size), one year of time for one person will not be one year for another person. This essentially happens because of an extremely heavy object; the space-time continuum is itself curved and time passes slowly.

This effect is usually very small and is not perceived in our regular lives. However, in the vicinity of huge stellar objects such as neutron stars, white dwarfs or black holes, this effect is quite significant.

From the above definition of Kalpa, we observe that one day (24 hours) of Brahma or Brahma-Loka is equivalent to 8.64 billion solar years.

Given that one day equals 24 x 60 x 60 = 86,400 seconds, equating both times, we obtain:

An object that can cause such intense time dilation must be extremely dense. Fortunately, we have a means to calculate some details about such an object (if it exists).

The equation used to determine gravitational time dilation is derived from the Schwarzschild metric and is given by:

where:

- G is the universal gravitational constant, 6.674 X 10^-11 N-m²/kg²

- M is the mass of the object causing the time dilation

- R is the radius of the object causing the time dilation

- c is the speed of light in a vacuum, 299,792,458 m/s

- t_o is the proper time

- t is the coordinated time

From the definition of Kalpa, we know t_o/t = 1/100,000 = 1 X 10^-5. Substituting the values of the time dilation factor of 1 X10^-5, we get:

1 X10^-5 =

Since (1 X10^-5)² = 1 X10^-10, which is an extremely small number, we can safely assume that:

1 - 1 X10^-10 ≈ 1. Therefore,

Substituting the values of G and c into the equation, we get M/r ≈ 6.73 X 10²⁶

If the mass-to-radius ratio is so large, it indicates an object that is extremely massive but relatively small compared to its mass. In other words, the Brahma-Loka being discussed is an object with this enormous density.

In our universe, there are very few objects that meet such criteria; they are either black holes or neutron stars. In 1974, a supermassive black hole was discovered at the centre of the Milky Way galaxy, located between Sagittarius A* and the Scorpio constellation. The radius of the Sagittarius A* supermassive black hole is approximately 1.2 X10¹⁰ meters. We know that the mass of the Sagittarius A* black hole, which is also the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Milky Way galaxy, is (8.54 ± 0.024) X10³⁶ kgs.

This results in M/r ratio as (7.11 ± 0.02) X 10²⁶. The difference between the calculated M/r ratio of Brahma-Loka and Sag-A* is ~5%.