About India

  

                     About India


      India is one of the oldest civilizations in the world with multicolored diversity and rich cultural heritage.  Along with this, it has also molded itself with changing times.  After attaining independence, India has made multifaceted social and economic progress.  India has become self-sufficient in agriculture and is now counted among the most industrialized countries in the world.  Being the seventh largest country in the world, India stands apart from the rest of Asia, which is characterized by mountains and seas, and they give it a unique geographical identity.  It is narrower than the Tropic of Cancer in the north, surrounded by a large mountain range of the Himalayas.  The Bay of Bengal in the east, the Arabian Sea in the west and the Hindu Ocean in the south determine its boundary.




* Interesting facts about India :

• India has not attacked any country in its last 100000 years of history.

• When many cultures were nomadic forest dwellers 5000 years ago, Indians established the Harappan culture in the Indus Valley (Indus Valley Civilization).

• The name 'India' in English is derived from the river Indus, in which the early civilizations inhabited the surrounding valley.  The Aryan worshippers have termed this Indus River as Sindhu.

•  The invaders from Iran used the Indus as a Hindu.  The name 'Hindustan' is a combination of Indus and Hindu, used to refer to the land of Hindus.

•  Chess was discovered in India.

• The study of seed mathematics, trigonometry and calculus began in India itself.

•  The 'place value system' and the 'decimal system' were developed in India in 100 BC.

•The world's first granite temple is the Brihadeeswarar Temple in Tanjore, Tamil Nadu.  The shikhara of this temple is made of 80-ton pieces of granite.  This magnificent temple was built in a period of only 5 years (during 1004 AD and 1009 AD) during the reign of Rajaraja Chola.

• India is the world's largest democracy and the world's seventh largest country and one of the ancient civilizations.

•The game of snake ladder was created by the poet saint Gyan Dev in the thirteenth century, it was originally called Mokshapat.  In this game the staircase represented boons while snakes represented demerits.  The game was played with caudas and dices.  Later on, many changes were made in this game, but its meaning remained the same, meaning that good deeds lead people to heaven, while bad deeds put them in the cycle of birth again.

• The highest cricket ground in the world is at a place called Chail in Himachal Pradesh.  It was prepared in 1893 by leveling the land at an altitude of 2444 meters above sea level.

•  India has the largest number of post offices around the world.

•Indian Railways is the largest employer in the country.  It provides employment to more than one million people.

•The first university in the world was established at Taxila in 700 BC.  In this, more than 10,500 students from more than 60 subjects came from all over the world and studied.  Nalanda University was established in the fourth century, which is one of the greatest achievements of ancient India in the field of education.

•Ayurveda is the earliest known medical branch known to mankind.  Charaka, considered the father of branch science, consolidated Ayurveda 2500 years ago.

• India was the richest country until the British rule in the early 17th century.  Christopher Columbus, attracted by the wealth of India, went searching for a sea route to India and accidentally discovered America.

• The art of shipping and shipping was born 6000 years ago in the Sindh River.  The first navigational cultural word in the world originated at a new pace.  The word navy is also derived from the Sanskrit word nou.

• Bhaskaracharya calculated the exact time taken by the Earth to circle around the Sun several hundred years before astronomy.  According to their calculations, the time taken by the Earth to orbit the Sun is  365.258756484 days.

• The value of 'pie' was found out by the Indian mathematician Budhayana and the concept he explained gives him the Pythagoras theorem.  He discovered it in the sixth century, long before European mathematicians.

• Seed mathematics, trigonometry and calculus also originated in India.  The quadratic equation was used by Sri Dharacharya in the 11th century.  The largest number used by the Greeks and Romans was 106 while the Hindus used specific names with numbers as large as 10 * 53 (ie 10 to 53), during 5000 B.C.  The largest number still used today is Terra: 10 * 12 (10 to the power of 12).

• Until 1896, India was the only source of diamonds in the world.  (Source: Gemological Institute of America)

• Belipul is the highest bridge in the world.  It is situated in the Ladakh Valley between the Dras and Suru rivers in the Himachal Mountains.  It was built by the Indian Army in August 1982.

• Sushruta is considered the father of surgical medicine.  About 2600 years ago Sushruta and his colleagues performed cataracts, prosthesis, prostate labor, fracture, bladder stones, plastic surgery and brain surgery.

• The use of anesthesia was well known in ancient Indian medicine.  Subjects like anatomy, embryology, digestion, metabolism, physiology, etiology, genetics and immunology are also found in ancient Indian texts.

• There were 4 religions born in India - Hindu, Buddhist, Jain and Sikh religions and which comprise 25 percent of the world's population.

• Jainism and Buddhism were founded in India in 600 BC and 500 BC respectively.

• Islam is the second largest religion in India and in the world.

• The oldest European church and synagogue in India are in the city of Cochin.  They were built in 1503 and 1568 respectively.

• Jews and Christians have lived in India since 200 BC and 52 AD respectively.

•  The largest religious edifice in the world is the Angkor Wat, a Hindu temple built in Cambodia during the 11th century.

•  Sikhism originated in the holy city of Amritsar in Punjab.  The famous Golden Temple was established here in 1577.

•  Varanasi, also known as Banaras, is an ancient city when Lord Buddha arrived here in 500 BC and is today the oldest and continuously growing city in the world.

•  The Honorable Dalai Lama is an exiled religious leader of Tibetan Buddhism, living in exile in Dharamshala, northern India.

• Martial arts were first developed in India and spread throughout Asia by Buddhist missionaries.

•  Yoga has its origins in India and has existed for more than 5,000 years.