The idea that Tibet was the homeland of Aryas came from Swami Dayananda Saraswati, who in the late 19th century, founded the famous Arya Samaj. He valued the Vedas as the original source of Hinduism, but saw Puranas including worship of Shiva-linga as a degeneration of Arya-dharma, a word he preferred over Hindu as the latter had Persian roots. 

The discovery of linguistic connections between Sanskrit and Latin, and the rising race science of 19th century Europe, had led many colonial scholars to theorise that light-skinned Aryans came from the West and conquered dark-skinned Dasyus. This theory gained currency amongst Dalit leaders like Jyotiba Phule who saw it as explaining the origin of the caste system. Brahmin scholars rejected this idea.