two types of liquor mentioned in the Rigveda
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Answer:
Alcohol came to India way earlier than anyone would guess. It ebbed and flowed with the powers that governed, sometimes rising to popularity and at other times slinking away into the shadows.
To correct that first statement, it didn’t actually "come" to India; alcohol was as much a homegrown essential as any other staple. We were among the first civilisations to discover the science of distillation and put it to good use. However, some historians dispute the claim that the Easterners were among the pioneers in distillation and state that it was invented by Europeans in the twelfth century.
Although ferments don’t feature as widely or popularly in our ancient past, many historians argue that the beverages mentioned in the Vedas were never stated to be distillates. There could be many reasons for this: we didn’t have the right ingredients for ferments, viz grapes or barley (although, in my research, I did find a mention of masara, a pre-Aryan rice, grass and barley drink that was consumed by the hill tribes of the northern provinces of our country).