Portal:India

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India Portal

Introduction

India (official name: the Republic of India; Hindi: Bhārat Gaṇarājya) is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. 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; China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the north; and Bangladesh and Myanmar to the east. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives; its Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand and Indonesia.

Modern humans arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa no later than 55,000 years ago. Their long occupation, initially in varying forms of isolation as hunter-gatherers, has made the region highly diverse, second only to Africa in human genetic diversity. Settled life emerged on the subcontinent in the western margins of the Indus river basin 9,000 years ago, evolving gradually into the Indus Valley Civilisation of the third millennium BCE. By 1200 BCE, an archaic form of Sanskrit, an Indo-European language, had diffused into India from the northwest, unfolding as the language of the Vedas, and recording the dawning of Hinduism in India. The Dravidian languages of India were supplanted in the northern regions. By 400 BCE, stratification and exclusion by caste had emerged within Hinduism, and Buddhism and Jainism had arisen, proclaiming social orders unlinked to heredity. Early political consolidations gave rise to the loose-knit Maurya and Gupta Empires based in the Ganges Basin, their collective era suffused with wide-ranging creativity, but also marked by the declining status of women, and the incorporation of untouchability into an organized system of belief. In south India, the Middle kingdoms exported Dravidian-languages scripts and religious cultures to the kingdoms of southeast Asia.

National Anthem of India

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Selected articles

The frontispiece of the 1920 edition of Tod's Annals and Antiquities of Rajast'han

Lieutenant-Colonel James Tod (20 March 1782 – 18 November 1835) was an English-born officer of the British East India Company and an Oriental scholar. He combined his official role and his amateur interests to create a series of works about the history and geography of India, and in particular the area then known as Rajputana that corresponds to the present day state of Rajasthan, and which Tod referred to as Rajast'han.

Tod was born in London and educated in Scotland. He joined the East India Company as a military officer and travelled to India in 1799 as a cadet in the Bengal Army. He rose quickly in rank, eventually becoming captain of an escort for an envoy in a Sindian royal court. After the Third Anglo-Maratha War, during which Tod was involved in the intelligence department, he was appointed Political Agent for some areas of Rajputana. His task was to help unify the region under the control of the East India Company. During this period Tod conducted most of the research that he would later publish. Tod was initially successful in his official role, but his methods were questioned by other members of the East India Company. Over time, his work was restricted and his areas of oversight were significantly curtailed. In 1823, owing to declining health and reputation, Tod resigned his post as Political Agent and returned to England.

Back home in England, Tod published a number of academic works about Indian history and geography, most notably Annals and Antiquities of Rajast'han, based on materials collected during his travels. He retired from the military in 1826, and married Julia Clutterbuck that same year. He died in 1835, aged 53. Read more...

Selected picture

The Toda people are a small pastoral tribe of less than 1,000 people who reside in the Nilgiri hills of Southern India. Shown here is a typical Toda hut, about 3 m (10 ft.) high, 5.5 m (18 ft.) long and 2.7 m (9 ft.) wide. They are built of bamboo fastened with rattan and thatched. The hut has only a tiny (about 0.9 x 0.9 m, 3 x 3 ft.) entrance at the front, which serves as protection from wild animals.

Photo credit: Pratheepps

Archive

Selected lists

News

15 September 2019 –: A sightseeing boat capsizes on the Godavari River in India's East Godavari district, killing at least 12 people and leaving 35 others missing, all Indian nationals. (The Independent)
6 September 2019 –: The Indian Space Research Organization loses contact with Vikram moments before its planned soft landing on the Moon. India would have been the fourth nation to have explored the lunar surface, had Vikram successfully landed, and it would have deployed the Pragyan rover onto the surface. (NPR)
31 August 2019 –: An explosion followed by a fire at a chemical factory in Dhule, India kills at least 12 and injures at least 58. (CNN); India releases the final version of the National Register of Citizens for the state of Assam. Up to 1.9 million residents risk losing their citizenship if they are not on the list and can not prove their residency. The move is criticized for disproportionately affecting the local Bengali community. (BBC)
21 August 2019 –: Indian senior opposition Rajya Sabha MP and former Cabinet Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram is arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation on charges of corruption and money laundering during his term as Minister of Finance. Chidambaram says to the Supreme Court that the government is practicing a "politically-motivated vendetta" against him and his son Karti, who is also an opposition MP. (BBC)
10 August 2019 –: The death toll due to the monsoon flooding in southern and western India rises to 147, while hundreds of thousands have been evacuated from their homes. (Al Jazeera)
8 August 2019 –: Floods hit the states of Karnataka and Kerala in India, resulting in 11 dead and 43,000 people being evacuated. (Gulf News)

Did you know...

... that in ancient Indian stories, a person "can bend the cosmic forces to his will" through an "act of truth"?
... that R. Hari Kumar took a staff course at the US Naval War College while serving in the Indian Navy?
... that Indian politician Anil Sarkar led efforts to provide relief and shelter for hundreds of thousands of refugees from the Bangladesh Liberation War?
... that in 1910, Indian obstetrician and gynaecologist Dossibai Patell became the first female member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England?
... that the Indian Member of Parliament Anju Bala believes that violence against cows can be curbed by declaring it the national animal of India?
... that Bandaru Dattatreya is the only minister from the Telangana state in the current Union Cabinet of India?
... that Tyrannomyrmex alii was named for India's "Ant Man"?
... that Adruti Laxmibai introduced free education for girls in the Indian state of Odisha?
... that the Hong Kong Regiment was paid more than other British Indian Army regiments and was known as "The Swagger Regiment"?
... that Mahant Chandnath, a Member of the Indian Parliament, is also the head of the Nath sect of Hinduism?
... that in India, a postal officer became a spymaster?
... that Birjis Qadr, the Nawab (leader) of Awadh state in northern India, became a poet while in exile in Nepal?
... that until 1968, some 5,000 people on the "Indian List", so-called due to the automatic inclusion of indigenous people, were prohibited from buying liquor from BC Liquor Stores?
... that Ankita Bhakat<nowiki>'</nowiki>s archery team, who entered the 2017 World Archery Youth Championships seeded ninth, won India's fourth overall world youth championships title?