A Think about INDIA

INDIA its world of beauty of nature and its is the most birth place of god it" start from the north at jammu kashmir ends at south in kanyakumari its the most histroical place like.....

and India (IAST: Bhārat), also called the Republic of India (IAST: Bhārat Gaṇarājya),[19][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 Bangladesh and Myanmar 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[20] 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 second largest standing army in the world and ranks fifth in military expenditure among nations. India is a federal republic governed under a parliamentary system and 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.

The name India is derived from Indus, which originates from the Old Persian word Hindu.[21] The latter term stems from the Sanskrit word Sindhu, which was the historical local appellation for the Indus River.[22] The ancient Greeks referred to the Indians as Indoi (Ἰνδοί), which translates as "The people of the Indus".[23]

The geographical term Bharat (Bhārat, pronounced [ˈbʱaːɾət̪] (About this sound listen)), which is recognised by the Constitution of India as an official name for the country,[24] is used by many Indian languages in its variations. It is a modernisation of the historical name Bharatavarsha, which traditionally referred to the Indian subcontinent and gained increasing currency from the mid-19th century as a native name for India.[19][25]

Hindustan ([ɦɪnd̪ʊˈst̪aːn] (About this sound listen)) is a Persian name for India dating back to the 3rd century BCE. It was introduced into India by the Mughals and widely used since then. Its meaning varied, referring to a region that encompassed northern India and Pakistan or India in its entirety.[19][25][26] Currently, the name may refer to either the northern part of India or the entire country.[26]

The earliest authenticated human remains in South Asia date to about 30,000 years ago.[27] Nearly contemporaneous Mesolithic rock art sites have been found in many parts of the Indian subcontinent, including at the Bhimbetka rock shelters in Madhya Pradesh.[28] Around 7000 BCE, one of the first known Neolithic settlements appeared on the subcontinent in Mehrgarh and other sites in the subcontinent.[29] These gradually developed into the Indus Valley Civilisation,[30] the first urban culture in South Asia;[31] it flourished during 2500–1900 BCE in northeast Afghanistan to Pakistan and northwest India.[32] Centred around cities such as Mohenjo-daro, Harappa, Dholavira, and Kalibangan, and relying on varied forms of subsistence, the civilisation engaged robustly in crafts production and wide-ranging trade.[31]

During the period 2000–500 BCE, in terms of culture, many regions of the subcontinent transitioned from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age.[33] The Vedas, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism,[34] were composed during this period,[35] and historians have analysed these to posit a Vedic culture in the Punjab region and the upper Gangetic Plain.[33] Most historians also consider this period to have encompassed several waves of Indo-Aryan migration into the subcontinent from the north-west.[34] The caste system, which created a hierarchy of priests, warriors, and free peasants, but which excluded indigenous peoples by labeling their occupations impure, arose during this period.[36] On the Deccan Plateau, archaeological evidence from this period suggests the existence of a chiefdom stage of political organisation.[33] In South India, a progression to sedentary life is indicated by the large number of megalithic monuments dating from this period,[37] as well as by nearby traces of agriculture, irrigation tanks, and craft traditions.[37]
Damaged brown painting of a reclining man and woman.
Paintings at the Ajanta Caves in Aurangabad, Maharashtra, 6th century

In the late Vedic period, around the 6th century BCE, the small states and chiefdoms of the Ganges Plain and the north-western regions had consolidated into 16 major oligarchies and monarchies that were known as the mahajanapadas.[38][39] The emerging urbanisation gave rise to non-Vedic religious movements, two of which became independent religions. Jainism came into prominence during the life of its exemplar, Mahavira.[40] Buddhism, based on the teachings of Gautama Buddha, attracted followers from all social classes excepting the middle class; chronicling the life of the Buddha was central to the beginnings of recorded history in India.[41][42][43] In an age of increasing urban wealth, both religions held up renunciation as an ideal,[44] and both established long-lasting monastic traditions. Politically, by the 3rd century BCE, the kingdom of Magadha had annexed or reduced other states to emerge as the Mauryan Empire.[45] The empire was once thought to have controlled most of the subcontinent excepting the far south, but its core regions are now thought to have been separated by large autonomous areas.[46][47] The Mauryan kings are known as much for their empire-building and determined management of public life as for Ashoka's renunciation of militarism and far-flung advocacy of the Buddhist dhamma.[48][49]

The Sangam literature of the Tamil language reveals that, between 200 BCE and 200 CE, the southern peninsula was being ruled by the Cheras, the Cholas, and the Pandyas, dynasties that traded extensively with the Roman Empire and with West and South-East Asia.[50][51] In North India, Hinduism asserted patriarchal control within the family, leading to increased subordination of women.[52][45] By the 4th and 5th centuries, the Gupta Empire had created in the greater Ganges Plain a complex system of administration and taxation that became a model for later Indian kingdoms.[53][54] Under the Guptas, a renewed Hinduism based on devotion rather than the management of ritual began to assert itself.[55] The renewal was reflected in a flowering of sculpture and architecture, which found patrons among an urban elite.[54] Classical Sanskrit literature flowered as well, and Indian science, astronomy, medicine, and mathematics made significant advances.[54]
Medieval India
The granite tower of Brihadeeswarar Temple in Thanjavur was completed in 1010 CE by Raja Raja Chola I.

The Indian early medieval age, 600 CE to 1200 CE, is defined by regional kingdoms and cultural diversity.[56] When Harsha of Kannauj, who ruled much of the Indo-Gangetic Plain from 606 to 647 CE, attempted to expand southwards, he was defeated by the Chalukya ruler of the Deccan.[57] When his successor attempted to expand eastwards, he was defeated by the Pala king of Bengal.[57] When the Chalukyas attempted to expand southwards, they were defeated by the Pallavas from farther south, who in turn were opposed by the Pandyas and the Cholas from still farther south.[57] No ruler of this period was able to create an empire and consistently control lands much beyond his core region.[56] During this time, pastoral peoples whose land had been cleared to make way for the growing agricultural economy were accommodated within caste society, as were new non-traditional ruling classes.[58] The caste system consequently began to show regional differences.[58]

In the 6th and 7th centuries, the first devotional hymns were created in the Tamil language.[59] They were imitated all over India and led to both the resurgence of Hinduism and the development of all modern languages of the subcontinent.[59] Indian royalty, big and small, and the temples they patronised drew citizens in great numbers to the capital cities, which became economic hubs as well.[60] Temple towns of various sizes began to appear everywhere as India underwent another urbanisation.[60] By the 8th and 9th centuries, the effects were felt in South-East Asia, as South Indian culture and political systems were exported to lands that became part of modern-day Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, and Java.[61] Indian merchants, scholars, and sometimes armies were involved in this transmission; South-East Asians took the initiative as well, with many sojourning in Indian seminaries and translating Buddhist and Hindu texts into their languages.[61]

After the 10th century, Muslim Central Asian nomadic clans, using swift-horse cavalry and raising vast armies united by ethnicity and religion, repeatedly overran South Asia's north-western plains, leading eventually to the establishment of the Islamic Delhi Sultanate in 1206.[62] The sultanate was to control much of North India and to make many forays into South India. Although at first disruptive for the Indian elites, the sultanate largely left its vast non-Muslim subject population to its own laws and customs.[63][64] By repeatedly repulsing Mongol raiders in the 13th century, the sultanate saved India from the devastation visited on West and Central Asia, setting the scene for centuries of migration of fleeing soldiers, learned men, mystics, traders, artists, and artisans from that region into the subcontinent, thereby creating a syncretic Indo-Islamic culture in the north.[65][66] The sultanate's raiding and weakening of the regional kingdoms of South India paved the way for the indigenous Vijayanagara Empire.[67] Embracing a strong Shaivite tradition and building upon the military technology of the sultanate, the empire came to control much of peninsular India,[68] and was to influence South Indian society for long afterwards.[67]
Early modern India
Writing the will and testament of the Mughal king in Persian, 1590–1595

In the early 16th century, northern India, being then under mainly Muslim rulers,[69] fell again to the superior mobility and firepower of a new generation of Central Asian warriors.[70] The resulting Mughal Empire did not stamp out the local societies it came to rule, but rather balanced and pacified them through new administrative practices[71][72] and diverse and inclusive ruling elites,[73] leading to more systematic, centralised, and uniform rule.[74] Eschewing tribal bonds and Islamic identity, especially under Akbar, the Mughals united their far-flung realms through loyalty, expressed through a Persianised culture, to an emperor who had near-divine status.[73] The Mughal state's economic policies, deriving most revenues from agriculture[75] and mandating that taxes be paid in the well-regulated silver currency,[76] caused peasants and artisans to enter larger markets.[74] The relative peace maintained by the empire during much of the 17th century was a factor in India's economic expansion,[74] resulting in greater patronage of painting, literary forms, textiles, and architecture.[77] Newly coherent social groups in northern and western India, such as the Marathas, the Rajputs, and the Sikhs, gained military and governing ambitions during Mughal rule, which, through collaboration or adversity, gave them both recognition and military experience.[78] Expanding commerce during Mughal rule gave rise to new Indian commercial and political elites along the coasts of southern and eastern India.[78] As the empire disintegrated, many among these elites were able to seek and control their own affairs.[79]

By the early 18th century, with the lines between commercial and political dominance being increasingly blurred, a number of European trading companies, including the English East India Company, had established coastal outposts.[80][81] The East India Company's control of the seas, greater resources, and more advanced military training and technology led it to increasingly flex its military muscle and caused it to become attractive to a portion of the Indian elite; these factors were crucial in allowing the company to gain control over the Bengal region by 1765 and sideline the other European companies.[82][80][83][84] Its further access to the riches of Bengal and the subsequent increased strength and size of its army enabled it to annex or subdue most of India by the 1820s.[85] India was then no longer exporting manufactured goods as it long had, but was instead supplying the British Empire with raw materials, and many historians consider this to be the onset of India's colonial period.[80] By this time, with its economic power severely curtailed by the British parliament and effectively having been made an arm of British administration, the company began to more consciously enter non-economic arenas such as education, social reform, and culture.[86]
Modern India
The British Indian Empire, from the 1909 edition of The Imperial Gazetteer of India. Areas directly governed by the British are shaded pink; the princely states under British suzerainty are in yellow.

Historians consider India's modern age to have begun sometime between 1848 and 1885. The appointment in 1848 of Lord Dalhousie as Governor General of the East India Company set the stage for changes essential to a modern state. These included the consolidation and demarcation of sovereignty, the surveillance of the population, and the education of citizens. Technological changes—among them, railways, canals, and the telegraph—were introduced not long after their introduction in Europe.[87][88][89][90] However, disaffection with the company also grew during this time, and set off the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Fed by diverse resentments and perceptions, including invasive British-style social reforms, harsh land taxes, and summary treatment of some rich landowners and princes, the rebellion rocked many regions of northern and central India and shook the foundations of Company rule.[91][92] Although the rebellion was suppressed by 1858, it led to the dissolution of the East India Company and the direct administration of India by the British government. Proclaiming a unitary state and a gradual but limited British-style parliamentary system, the new rulers also protected princes and landed gentry as a feudal safeguard against future unrest.[93][94] In the decades following, public life gradually emerged all over India, leading eventually to the founding of the Indian National Congress in 1885.[95][96][97][98]
Jawaharlal Nehru sharing a joke with Mahatma Gandhi, Mumbai, 6 July 1946
Jawaharlal Nehru (left) became India's first prime minister in 1947. Mahatma Gandhi (right) led the independence movement.

The rush of technology and the commercialisation of agriculture in the second half of the 19th century was marked by economic setbacks—many small farmers became dependent on the whims of far-away markets.[99] There was an increase in the number of large-scale famines,[100] and, despite the risks of infrastructure development borne by Indian taxpayers, little industrial employment was generated for Indians.[101] There were also salutary effects: commercial cropping, especially in the newly canalled Punjab, led to increased food production for internal consumption.[102] The railway network provided critical famine relief,[103] notably reduced the cost of moving goods,[103] and helped the nascent Indian-owned industry.[102]
About 14.5 million people lost their homes as a result of the partition of India in 1947.

After World War I, in which approximately one million Indians served,[104] a new period began. It was marked by British reforms but also repressive legislations, by more strident Indian calls for self-rule, and by the beginnings of a nonviolent movement of non-co-operation, of which Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi would become the leader and enduring symbol.[105] During the 1930s, slow legislative reform was enacted by the British; the Indian National Congress won victories in the resulting elections.[106] The next decade was beset with crises: Indian participation in World War II, the Congress's final push for non-co-operation, and an upsurge of Muslim nationalism. All were capped by the advent of independence in 1947, but tempered by the partition of India into two states: India and Pakistan.[107]

Vital to India's self-image as an independent nation was its constitution, completed in 1950, which put in place a secular and democratic republic.[108] It has remained a democracy with civil liberties, an active Supreme Court, and a largely independent press.[109] Economic liberalisation, which was begun in the 1990s, has created a large urban middle class, transformed India into one of the world's fastest-growing economies,[110] and increased its geopolitical clout. Indian movies, music, and spiritual teachings play an increasing role in global culture.[109] Yet, India is also shaped by seemingly unyielding poverty, both rural and urban;[109] by religious and caste-related violence;[111] by Maoist-inspired Naxalite insurgencies;[112] and by separatism in Jammu and Kashmir and in Northeast India.[113] It has unresolved territorial disputes with China[114] and with Pakistan.[114] The India–Pakistan nuclear rivalry came to a head in 1998.[115] India's sustained democratic freedoms are unique among the world's newer nations; however, in spite of its recent economic successes, freedom from want for its disadvantaged population remains a goal yet to be achieved.[116]

and some deatils about india
         
                                                                            Republic of India

Bhārat Gaṇarājya
Horizontal tricolor flag bearing, from top to bottom, deep saffron, white, and green horizontal bands. In the centre of the white band is a navy-blue wheel with 24 spokes.
Flag
Three lions facing left, right, and toward viewer, atop a frieze containing a galloping horse, a 24-spoke wheel, and an elephant. Underneath is a motto: "सत्यमेव जयते".
State emblem
Motto: "Satyameva Jayate" (Sanskrit)
"Truth Alone Triumphs"[1]
Anthem: "Jana Gana Mana" (Hindi)[2]
"Thou Art the Ruler of the Minds of All People"[3][2]
Menu
0:00
National song
"Vande Mataram" (Sanskrit)
"I Bow to Thee, Mother"[a][1][2]
Image of a globe centred on India, with India highlighted.
Area controlled by India shown in dark green;
claimed but uncontrolled regions shown in light green.
Capital New Delhi
28°36.8′N 77°12.5′E
Largest city Mumbai
18°58′30″N 72°49′33″E
Official languages

HindiEnglish[b][6]

Recognised regional languages
State level and
Eighth Schedule[7]
[show]
National language None[8][9][10]
Religion

79.8% Hinduism
14.2% Islam
2.3% Christianity
1.7% Sikhism
0.7% Buddhism
0.4% Jainism
0.9% others[c][11]

Demonym Indian
Government Federal parliamentary
constitutional socialist[12]
republic[1]
• President
Ram Nath Kovind
• Vice President
Venkaiah Naidu
• Prime Minister
Narendra Modi
• Chief Justice
Dipak Misra
• Speaker of the Lok Sabha
Sumitra Mahajan
Legislature Parliament
• Upper house
Rajya Sabha
• Lower house
Lok Sabha
Independence from the United Kingdom
• Dominion
15 August 1947
• Republic
26 January 1950
Area
• Total
3,287,263[5] km2 (1,269,219 sq mi)[d] (7th)
• Water (%)
9.6
Population
• 2016 estimate
1,324,171,354[13] (2nd)
• 2011 census
1,210,854,977[14][15] (2nd)
• Density
397.6/km2 (1,029.8/sq mi) (31st)
GDP (PPP) 2018 estimate
• Total
$10.385 trillion[16] (3rd)
• Per capita
$7,783[16] (116th)
GDP (nominal) 2018 estimate
• Total
$2.848 trillion[16] (6th)
• Per capita
$2,134[16] (133rd)
Gini (2013) 33.9[17]
medium · 79th
HDI (2015) Increase 0.624[18]
medium · 131st
Currency Indian rupee (₹) (INR)
Time zone IST (UTC+05:30)
DST is not observed
Date format dd-mm-yyyy
Drives on the left
Calling code +91
ISO 3166 code IN
Internet TLD .