The claim I have seen is for verses from the Mahabharata:

...a single projectile
Charged with all the power of the Universe.
An incandescent column of smoke and flame
As bright as the thousand suns
Rose in all its splendour...
a perpendicular explosion
with its billowing smoke clouds...
...the cloud of smoke
rising after its first explosion
formed into expanding round circles
like the opening of giant parasols...

..it was an unknown weapon,
An iron thunderbolt,
A gigantic messenger of death,
Which reduced to ashes
The entire race of the Vrishnis and the Andhakas.
...The corpses were so burned
As to be unrecognisable.
The hair and nails fell out;
Pottery broke without apparent cause,
And the birds turned white.

I need hardly point out that the date given is as fictional as the rest.

Note however what this website (just quoting a bit, read the rest) [www.uforq.asn.au] says:
"In my opinion, the nadir of deceptive misrepresentation is attained not by Leslie but by Charles Berlitz in his 1974 book The Bermuda Triangle (chapter 8), in which occurs the following: 'A description of a special weapon launched against an opposing army goes as follows:" thence comes this lengthy quotation from the Mahabharata:

'A single projectile charged with all the power of the universe. An incandescent column of smoke and flame, as bright as 10,000 suns, rose in all its splendour…. It was an unknown weapon, and iron thunderbolt, a gigantic messenger of death which reduced to ashes the entire race of the Vrishnis and Andhakas…. The corpses were so burned as to be unrecognisable. Their hair and nails fell out; pottery broke without any apparent cause, and the birds turned white. After a few hours, all foodstuffs were infected…. To escape from this fire, the soldiers threw themselves in streams to wash themselves and all their equipment.'

I have reproduced this quotation exactly as it appears in Berlitz's book in order to illustrate my point. Readers could naturally assume that Berlitz was quoting one single passage with a few superfluous words omitted here and there, which on face value reads like an ancient writer's account of an atomic explosion and its aftermath. How wrong they would be. What Berlitz has done is to collate various totally unrelated excerpts from different chapters of the Mahabharata and weave them into one apparently seamless fabric, but a dissection of the passages in question reveals the truth. The front part, 'a single projectile --- all its splendour' has its origin in Karna Parva, section 34. The second part, 'it was an unknown weapon --- Andhakas' derives from Mausala Parva section 1, reconnecting events which occurred no less than 36 years after the great battle which is the central focus of the Mahabharata. A third part 'the corpses --- unrecognisable' refers back in time to the much earlier Drona Parva section 201, and the already mentioned Agneya weapon. The fourth part, 'the hair and nails --- infected' leaps forward in time once again to Mausala Parva, section 2. In the fifth part, 'to escape --- equipment,' we are time-warped back to Drona Parva section 197. In just one paragraph, Berlitz has managed to cobble and stich five unrelated excerpts, widely separated in both place and time, and presented them as one coherent whole allegedly representing a nuclear explosion. It is a totally dishonest cut and past job which does Berlitz no credit at all." ... "As a final parting shot, I simply cannot pass over in silence the fourth part of the above passage, which must rank as a classic of selective misquotation. Hair and nails falling out, birds turning white, food being infected - all very evocative of radioactive contamination in the aftermath of a nuclear explosion. What section 2 of the Mausala Pareva actually says, however, paints a very different picture. The full passage is rather lengthy, so I have presented the relevant excerpts:

'Day by day strong winds blow and many were the evil omens that arose, awful and foreboding the destruction of the Vrishnis and the Andhakas. The streets swarmed with rats and mice. Earthen pots showed cracks or broken (sic) from no apparent cause. At night, the rats ad mice ate away the hair and nails of slumbering men. --- many birds appeared, impelled by death, that were pale of complexion but that had legs red of hue --- the Vrishni's, committing sinful acts, were not seen to feel any shame --- they insulted and humiliated their preceptors and seniors --- wives deceived their husbands and husbands their wives --- the sun, whether when rising or setting over the city, seemed to be surrounded by headless trunks of human form. In cook rooms, upon food that was clean and well boiled were seen, when it was served out for eating, innumerable worms of diverse kinds,' etc.

it should be quite apparent that, as clearly and unambiguously stated at the beginning of the passage, what we have here is yet another example of the 'omens and portents' discussed earlier, but presented in a novel form. Hair and nails did not fall out, they were eaten by mice. To say that white birds appeared is quite different from birds turning white. (I am simply analysing this passage at face value. We need not suppose that any of this actually happened.) it is almost superfluous of me to ad that the destruction of said Vishnis and Andhakas does not occur until two pages after the above passages, not before it. The latter is not describing the effects of such destruction but rather the portents which preceded it."

It's worth reading the rest of that web page.

Doug Weller

Director The Hall of Ma'at
Doug's Skeptical Archaeology site::
[www.ramtops.co.uk]