India beckons to global citizens with its wealth of history, spiritual traditions and many-layered complexity: mixing the ultra-modern and high tech with the poverty and challenges of the third world.
(The text below is copied and pasted from Wikipedia)
India, officially the Republic of India (Bhārat Gaṇarājya),[e] is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country (with over 1.2 billion people), and the most populous democracy in the world. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast. It shares land borders with Pakistan to the west;[f] China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the northeast; and Myanmar (Burma) and Bangladesh to the east. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives. India’s Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand and Indonesia.
The Indian subcontinent was home to the urban Indus Valley Civilisation of the 3rd millennium BCE. In the following millennium, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism began to be composed. Social stratification, based on caste, emerged in the first millennium BCE, and Buddhism and Jainism arose. Early political consolidations took place under the Maurya and Gupta empires; the later peninsular Middle Kingdoms influenced cultures as far as southeast Asia. In the medieval era, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived, and Sikhism emerged, all adding to the region’s diverse culture. Much of the north fell to the Delhi sultanate; the south was united under the Vijayanagara Empire. The economy expanded in the 17th century in the Mughal Empire. In the mid-18th century, the subcontinent came under British East India Company rule, and in the mid-19th under British crown rule. A nationalist movement emerged in the late 19th century, which later, under Mahatma Gandhi, was noted for nonviolent resistance and led to India’s independence in 1947.
In 2017, the Indian economy was the world’s sixth largest by nominal GDP and third largest by purchasing power parity.[16] Following market-based economic reforms in 1991, India became one of the fastest-growing major economies and is considered a newly industrialised country. However, it continues to face the challenges of poverty, corruption, malnutrition, and inadequate public healthcare. A nuclear weapons state and regional power, it has the third largest standing army in the world and ranks fifth in military expenditure among nations. India is a federal republic governed under a parliamentary systemand consists of 29 states and 7 union territories. It is a pluralistic, multilingual and multi-ethnic society and is also home to a diversity of wildlife in a variety of protected habitats.
Map of India
Thumbnail of India’s History
Thumbnail of India’s History
(adapted from http://www.goforindia.com/ )
Indian History is as old as the History of Mankind. Artifacts dating back to as much as 500, 000 years have been found. India’s history and culture is ancient and dynamic, spanning back to the beginning of human civilization. Beginning with a mysterious culture along the Indus River and in farming communities in the southern lands of India. The history of India is one punctuated by constant integration with migrating peoples and with the diverse cultures that surround India. Placed in the center of Asia, history in India is a crossroads of cultures from China to Europe, and the most significant Asian connection with the cultures of Africa.
India’s history is more than just a set of unique developments in a definable process; it is, in many ways, a microcosm of human history itself, a diversity of cultures all impinging on a great people and being reforged into new, syncretic forms. Shown below is the India timeline starting from 3000 BC of ancient Indus valley civilization and Harappa civilization to 1000 AD of Chola Dynasty of ancient history of India.
Indian History In Short
Indian History in Short :
The History of India begins with the birth of the Indus Valley Civilization in such sites as Mohenjo-Daro, Harappa, and Lothal, and the coming of the Aryans. These two phases are usually described as the pre-Vedic and Vedic periods. It is in the Vedic period that Hinduism first arose: this is the time to which the Vedas are dated.
In the fifth century, large parts of India were united under Ashoka. He also converted to Buddhism, and it is in his reign that Buddhism spread to other parts of Asia. It is in the reign of the Mauryas that Hinduism took the shape that fundamentally informs the religion down to the present day. Successor states were more fragmented.
Islam first came to India in the eighth century, and by the 11th century had firmly established itself in India as a political force; the North Indian dynasties of the Lodhis, Tughlaqs, and numerous others, whose remains are visible in Delhi and scattered elsewhere around North India, were finally succeeded by the Mughal empire, under which India once again achieved a large measure of political unity.
The European presence in India dates to the seventeenth century and it is in the latter part of this century that the Mughal Empire began to disintegrate, paving the way for regional states. In the contest for supremacy, the English emerged ‘victors’, their rule marked by the conquests at the battlefields of Plassey and Buxar.
The Rebellion of 1857-58, which sought to restore Indian supremacy, was crushed; and with the subsequent crowning of Victoria as Empress of India, the incorporation of India into the empire was complete. Successive campaigns had the effect of driving the British out of India in 1947.
Timeline of Indian History
Timeline of Indian History
2,600 BCA great civilization arises in the Indus Valley – declines around 1700 BC
1,500 BC The Aryans enter India. Iron tools used 1,000 BC; rice cultivation 600 BC
322 BC Chandragupta Maurya becomes king of Magadha and he creates an empire, the Mauryan Empire
120 BC Nomads from Central Asia slowly conquer northern India. Kushan Empire rises; then Gupta in early 4th C.
335-1300s Various empires: Samudragupta & Gupta Empire India flourishes; Chola Empire and then Delhi Sultinate followed by Vijayanagar Empire.
1498 Timurlaine (Turko-Mongol leader) sacks Delhi. The Portuguese reach India by sea.
1526 Babur ruler of Afghanistan wins the battle of Panipat and begins the Mughal Empire.
1653 The Taj Mahal is completed
1673 The French establish a base at Pondicherry; 1690 English in Bengal
1712 The Mughal Empire begins to break up
1757 India becomes a British colony rather than a French one when Clive wins a great victory at Plassey.
1819 The British East India Company rules all of India except the Northwest
1849 The British take control of Punjab
1857-8 The Indian Mutiny is crushed. Control is switched from the East India Company to the British government.
1920 Gandhi launches a campaign of non-co-operation with the British
1930 Gandhi leads a march to the sea to collect salt
1935 The British grant India a new constitution
1940 Muslims demand their own state
1947, 15 August India becomes independent (Gandhi murdered 1948)
1962 India fights a war with China
1971 India fights a war with Pakistan
1997-2007+ The Indian economy grows at over 7% a year
