A. B. Walawalkar (27 December 1897 – 23 December 1970) was an

Indian Indian or Indians may refer to: Peoples South Asia * Indian people, people of Indian nationality, or people who have an Indian ancestor ** Non-resident Indian, a citizen of India who has temporarily emigrated to another country * South Asia ...

railway engineer,

epigraphist Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...

, and historian. He is regarded as the founder of

Konkan Railway The Konkan Railway (abbreviated KR) is one of the 19 railway zones in India with its headquarters at CBD Belapur in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. The first passenger train ran on Konkan railway tracks on 20 March 1993, between Udupi and ...

. Born on 27 December 1897, he was from the village of Walawal in

Kudal Kudal is a census town in Sindhudurg district, Maharashtra, India. It is situated on River Karli in southwest Maharashtara. Kudal is the fourth largest town in Sindhudurg after Sawantwadi, Malvan and Kankavli. As of 2011, the population is 16,0 ...

Taluka of

Sindhudurg District Sindhudurg district (Marathi pronunciation: in̪d̪ʱud̪uɾɡ is an administrative district of the Konkan division in India, which was carved out of the erstwhile Ratnagiri district. The district headquarters are located at Oros and the dis ...

Maharashtra Maharashtra (; , abbr. MH or Maha) is a states and union territories of India, state in the western India, western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. Maharashtra is the List of states and union te ...

. He belongs to Naik Maratha Samaj of Sindhudurg.

Career

Railway engineering

Shri Arjun Balwant Walawalkar joined Central India Railway (presently Western Railway) in its Engineering Drawing Department in 1922. In 1952 he published a booklet on

Project. He delivered seminars and wrote many articles in local and national newspapers about this project. Many people criticized Walawalkar, believing the project was not useful.

Indian epigraphy and history

Besides his public career, he was an eminent epigraphist. He studied the Brahmi epigraphy in ancient India. He tried to decipher the

Indus script The Indus script, also known as the Harappan script, is a corpus of symbols produced by the Indus Valley Civilisation. Most inscriptions containing these symbols are extremely short, making it difficult to judge whether or not they constituted ...

. He suggested a theory of development of the Indian epigraphic system according to the Maheshwara Sutras. He also proposed that the Indus script is akin to the Assyrian cuneiform & both have developed from an ancient Indic script, which he called 'Pre-Ashokan Brahmi'. He also studied medieval inscriptions in South Konkan & proposed new theories about the history and origin of the Sawant rulers of

Sawantwadi Sawantwadi an aesthetic land of artists, is an integral part of the Konkan region which is in the mid-western coast of India. The western coast of India since 1510 A.D. has assumed great importance in Indian history and history of internationa ...

. He theorized that Mang Sawant described in an inscription at Mathgaon (located in

Vengurla Vengurla is a town in Sindhudurg district of Maharashtra, India just north of Goa. It is surrounded by a semicircular range of hills with lush green foliage mainly of cashew, mango, coconut, and different kinds of berry trees. The hills of Dabh ...

Taluka), was an earlier ruler of Kudal region and ancestor of the Kshatriya Sawant family, who migrated to South Konkan after the fall of the Shilaharas.मठगांवचा शिलालेख आणि कुडाळ प्रांताचा प्राचीन इतिहास - अ. ब. वालावलकर, १९३२. (in Marathi)

References

External links

* http://www.irfca.org/articles/vikas/stamps.html * https://openlibrary.org/works/OL6050237W/Pre-Asokan_Brahmi * http://colnect.com/hi/stamps/stamp/161724-ABWalawalkar {{DEFAULTSORT:Walawalkar, A. B. 1897 births 1970 deaths Indian people in rail transport Writers from Maharashtra Indian epigraphers Marathi people