India is the most attractive and greatly
traditional cultured country in South Asia,
which makes it the top most travel destination for visitors all over the world.
Sometimes it also called “whole world gathered in India”,
you can find each and every culture in India (i.e. Bharat). It is the seventh-largest
country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2
billion people, 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; Bhutan, the People's
Republic of China and Nepal to the northeast; and Bangladesh and Burma to the
east. In the Indian Ocean, India
is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka
and the Maldives; in
addition, India's Andaman
and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand
and Indonesia.
Home to the ancient Indus
Valley Civilization and a region of historic trade routes and vast empires, the
Indian subcontinent was identified with its commercial and cultural wealth for
much of its long history. Four of the world's major religions—Hinduism,
Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism—originated here, whereas Zoroastrianism, Christianity
and Islam arrived in the 1st millennium CE and also helped shape the region's diverse
culture. Gradually annexed and administered by the British East India Company
from the early 18th century and administered directly by the United Kingdom from the mid-19th century, India became an
independent nation in 1947 after a struggle for independence which was marked
by non-violent resistance and led by Mahatma Gandhi.
The Indian economy is the
world's ninth-largest economy by nominal GDP and fourth largest economy by purchasing
power parity (PPP). Following market-based economic reforms in 1991, India has
become one of the fastest growing major economies, and is considered a newly
industrialized country; however, it continues to face the challenges of poverty,
illiteracy, corruption and inadequate public health. A nuclear weapons state
and a regional power, it has the third-largest standing army in the world and
ranks tenth in military expenditure among nations.
India is a federal constitutional
republic governed under a parliamentary system consisting of 28 states and 7
union territories. It is one of the 5 BRICS nations. India is a pluralistic, multilingual,
and multiethnic society. It is also home to a diversity of wildlife in a
variety of protected habitats.
Ancient
India
The earliest anatomically
modern human remains found in South Asia are
from approximately 30,000 years ago. Near contemporaneous Mesolithic rock art
sites have been found in many parts of the Indian subcontinent, including at
the Bhimbetka rock shelters in Madhya Pradesh. Around 7000 BCE, the first known
Neolithic settlements appeared on the subcontinent in Mehrgarh and other sites
in western Pakistan.
These gradually developed into the Indus Valley Civilization, the first urban
culture in South Asia, which flourished during 2500–1900 BCE in Pakistan and western India. Centered on cities such as Mohenjo-Daro, Harappa,
Dholavira, and Kalibangan, and relying on varied forms of subsistence, the civilization
engaged robustly in crafts production and wide-ranging trade. Beautiful paintings
present at the Ajanta Caves in Aurangabad, Maharashtra of sixth century.
During the period 2000–500
BCE, many regions of the subcontinent evolved from copper age to Iron Age
cultures. The Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, were composed during
this period, and historians have analyzed these to posit a Vedic culture in the
Punjab region and the upper Ganges Plain.
Most historians also consider this period to have encompassed several
waves of Indo-Aryan migration into the subcontinent from the northwest. The caste
system, which spawned a social hierarchy, appeared during this period. In the Deccan, archaeological evidence from this period suggests
the existence of a chiefdom stage of political organization. In South India, the large number of megalithic monuments
found from this period, and nearby evidence of agriculture, irrigation tanks,
and craft traditions suggest progression to sedentary life.
By the fifth century BCE,
the small chiefdoms of the Ganges Plain and the northwest regions had
consolidated into 16 major oligarchies and monarchies called Mahajanapadas.
The emerging urbanization as well as the orthodoxies of the late Vedic age
created the religious reform movements of Buddhism and Jainism. Buddhism, based
on the teachings of India's
first historical figure, Gautam Buddha, attracted followers from all social
classes; Jainism came into prominence around the same time during the life of
its exemplar, Mahavira. In an age of increasing urban wealth, both religions
held up renunciation as an ideal and both established long-lasting monasteries.
Politically, by the 3rd century BCE, the kingdom of Magadha
had annexed or reduced other states to emerge as the Mauryan Empire. 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. The Mauryan kings are known as much for their empire building
and determined management of public life as for Ashoka the Great, who renounced
militarism and widely advocated the Buddhist religion.
The Sangam literature of
the Tamil language reveals that during the period from 200 BCE to 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. In north Indian families, Hinduism
asserted patriarchal control. By the fourth and fifth centuries CE,
the Gupta Empire had created a complex administrative and taxation system in
the greater Ganges Plain that became a model for later Indian kingdoms. Under
the Guptas, a renewed Hinduism based on devotion rather than the management of
ritual began to assert itself; this was reflected in a flowering of sculpture
and architecture, which found patrons among an urban elite. Classical Sanskrit
literature flowered as well, and Indian science, astronomy, medicine, and mathematics
made significant advances.
Medieval
India
The Indian early medieval
age (600 CE to 1200 CE) is defined by regional kingdoms and cultural diversity.
When Harsha of Kannauj, who ruled much of the Ganges plain from 606 to 647 CE,
attempted to expand southwards, he was defeated by the Chalukya ruler of the Deccan. When his successor attempted to expand eastwards,
he was defeated by the Pala king of Bengal.
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. No ruler of this period was able to create an empire and
consistently control lands much beyond his core region. During this
time, pastoral peoples whose land was usurped by cultivators were accommodated
within caste society, as were new non-traditional ruling classes. The
caste system consequently began to show regional differences.
In the sixth and seventh
centuries CE, the first devotional hymns were created in the Tamil language.
These were imitated all over India
and led both to the resurgence of Hinduism and to the development of all the modern
languages of the subcontinent. Indian royalty, big and small, and the temples
they patronized, drew citizens in great numbers to the capital cities, which
became economic hubs as well. Temple towns of
various sizes began to appear everywhere as India underwent urbanization. By
the eight and ninth centuries, the effects were evident in South Indian culture
and elsewhere, as political systems were exported to Southeast Asia, in
particular to lands now composing Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia,
and Java. Indian merchants, scholars, and at times armies were involved in this
transmission; south-east Asians sojourned in Indian seminaries and translated
Buddhist and Hindu texts into their languages.
After the tenth 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, and led eventually to the
establishment of the Islamic Delhi Sultanate in 1206. 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. By repeatedly
repulsing the Mongol raiders in the thirteenth century, the Sultanate saved
India from the destruction seen in west and central Asia, and set the scene for
centuries of migration of fleeing soldiers, learned men, mystics, traders,
artists, and artisans from that region into India, thereby creating a syncretc
Indo-Islamic culture in the north. The Sultanate's raiding and weakening of the
regional kingdoms of South India, paved the
way for the indigenous Vijayanagara Empire. Embracing a strong Shaivite
tradition and building upon the military technology of the Sultanate, the
empire came to control much of peninsular India and influence South Indian
society and culture long afterwards.
Early
Modern India
In the early sixteenth
century, northern India,
being ruled then mainly by Muslim rulers, fell again to the superior mobility
and firepower of a new generation of Central Asian warriors. 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 and diverse and
inclusive ruling elites, leading to more systematic, centralized,
and uniform rule. Eschewing tribal bonds and Islamic identity, especially under
Akbar, the Mughals united their far flung realms through loyalty, expressed
through a Persians culture, to an emperor who had near divine status. The
Mughal states economic policies, deriving most revenues from agriculture, and
mandating that taxes be paid in the well-regulated silver currency, caused
peasants and artisans to enter larger markets. The relative peace maintained by
the empire during much of the seventeenth century was a factor in India's
economic expansion, and resulted in greater patronage of painting, literary
forms, textiles, and architecture. 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. Expanding commerce
during Mughal rule gave rise to new Indian commercial and political elites in
the southern and eastern coastal India. As the empire disintegrated, many among these
elites were able to seek and control their own affairs.
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 outposts on coastal India. The East India Company's
control of the seas, its greater resources, and its army's more advanced
training and technology, led it to increasingly flex its military muscle and
caused it to become attractive to a portion of the Indian elite; both these
factors were crucial in allowing the Company to gain control over the Bengal
region by 1765, and sidelining the other European companies. 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. India was now no longer exporting manufactured
goods as it long had, but was instead supplying the British Empire with raw
materials, and most historians consider this to be the true onset of India's
colonial period. By this time also, with its economic power severely
curtailed by the British parliament and effectively now an arm of British
administration, the Company began to more consciously enter non-economic arenas
such as education, social reform, and culture.
Modern
India
Depending upon the
historian, India's modern age may have begun in 1848, when the appointment of
Lord Dalhousie as Governor General of the Company rule in India inaugurated
changes essential to the development of a modern state: the demarcation and
consolidation of sovereignty; the surveillance of the population; the education
of citizens; and the construction of railways, canals, and telegraph lines,
which were introduced not long after they had taken root in Europe. The age may
have begun in 1857, when British-style social reforms, harsh land taxes, and
humiliations borne by landed and princely aristocracy led to the Indian
rebellion of 1857 that challenged Company rule and ravaged many parts of
northern India.
It may also have begun in 1858 when, after the rebels were suppressed, the
British government opted for direct administration of India and
proclaimed a unitary state, which on the one hand envisaged slow transition to
a British-style parliamentary system, but on the other hand favored Indian
princes and landlords as a feudal safeguard against popular unrest. Lastly, its
modern era may have commenced with the founding of the Indian National Congress
in 1885, thus marking the start of an all-India public life.
Jawaharlal Nehru became India's first
prime minister in 1947. Mahatma Gandhi led the independence movement.
The rush of technology and
the commercialization of agriculture in the second half of the 19th century were
marked by economic setbacks—many small farmers became dependent on the whims of
far-away markets. There was an increase in the number of large-scale famines
and, despite the Indian taxpayers enduring the risks of infrastructure development;
little industrial employment was generated for Indians. There were also
salutary effects: commercial cropping, especially in the newly canalled Punjab, increased food production for internal
consumption, the railway network provided critical famine relief, notably
reduced the cost of moving goods, and helped nascent Indian-owned industry.
After the First World War, in which some one million Indians served, a new
period began, which was marked by British reforms, but also repressive
legislation, by more strident Indian calls for self-rule, and by the beginnings
of a nonviolent movement of non-cooperation, of which Mohandas Karamchand
Gandhi would become the leader and enduring symbol. During the 1930s, slow
legislative reform was enacted by the British and the Indian National Congress
won victories in the resulting elections. However, the next decade would be
beset with crises, which included, the Second World War, the Congress's final
push of non-cooperation, and the upsurge of Muslim nationalism—all capped by
the independence of India
in 1947, but tempered by the bloody partition of the subcontinent into two
states.
Vital to India's
self-image as an independent nation was its constitution, completed in 1950,
which put in place a sovereign, secular, democratic republic. In the 60 years
since, India
has had a mixed bag of successes and failures. It has remained a democracy with
civil liberties, an activist Supreme Court, and a largely independent press;
economic liberalization, which was begun in the 1990s, has created a large
urban middle-class, transformed India
into one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, and increased its
global clout; and Indian movies, music, and spiritual teachings, have
increasingly contributed to global culture. And yet India
harbors seemingly unyielding rural and urban poverty and hosts religious, caste-related
violence, Maoist-inspired Naxalite insurgencies and separatists in Jammu and Kashmir. It
has unresolved territorial disputes with the People's Republic of China, which
escalated into the Sino-Indian War of 1962; and with Pakistan, which
flared into wars fought in 1947, 1965, 1971, and 1999. The
Indo-Pakistani nuclear rivalry came to a head in 1998. India's democratic freedoms, which
have survived for over 60 years, are unique among the world's new nations;
however, in spite of its recent economic successes, freedom from want for its
disadvantaged population remains a goal yet to be realized.
Geography
India comprises the bulk of the Indian
subcontinent and lies atop the minor Indian tectonic plate, which in turn
belongs to the Indo-Australian Plate. India's
defining geological processes commenced seventy five million years ago when the
Indian subcontinent, then part of the southern super continent Gondwana, began northeastwards
drift across the then-unformed Indian Ocean
that lasted fifty million years. The subcontinent's subsequent collision with subduction
under the Eurasian Plate bore aloft the planet's highest mountains, the Himalayas. They abut India in the north and the north-east.
In the former seabed immediately south of the emerging Himalayas,
plate movement created a vast trough that has gradually filled with river-borne
sediment; it now forms the Indo-Gangetic Plain. To the west lies the Thar
Desert, which cut-off by the Aravalli
Range.
The original Indian plate
survives as peninsular India,
the oldest and geologically most stable part of India
and extends as far north as the Satpura and Vindhya ranges in central India. These
parallel ranges run from the Arabian Sea coast in Gujarat
in the west to the coal-rich Chota Nagpur Plateau in Jharkhand in the east. To
the south the remaining peninsular landmass, the Deccan Plateau, is flanked on
the west and east by the coastal ranges, the Western and Eastern
Ghats respectively; the plateau contains the nation's oldest rock
formations, some over one billion years old. Constituted in such fashion, India lies to
the north of the equator between 6° 44' and 35° 30' north latitude and 68° 7'
and 97° 25' east longitude.
The Kedar Range
of the Greater Himalayas rises behind Kedarnath Temple,
one of the twelve Jyotirlinga shrines.
India's coast is 7,517 kilometers (4,700 mi) long; of this
distance, 5,423 kilometers (3,400 mi) belong to peninsular India and 2,094 kilometers (1,300 mi) to
the Andaman, Nicobar, and Lakshadweep
Islands. According to the
Indian naval hydrographic charts, the mainland coast consists of the following:
43% sandy beaches, 11% rocky coast including cliffs, and 46% mudflats or marshy
coast.
Major Himalayan-origin
rivers that substantially flow through India
include the Ganges (Ganga) and the Brahmaputra, both of which drain into the Bay of Bengal. Important tributaries of the Ganges include the Yamuna and the Kosi; the latter's
extremely low gradient causes disastrous floods every year. Major peninsular
rivers, whose steeper gradients prevent their waters from flooding, include the
Godavari, the Mahanadi, the Kaveri, and the Krishna, which also drain into the
Bay of Bengal; and the Narmada and the Tapti, which drain into the Arabian Sea. Among notable coastal features of India are the marshy Rann of Kutch in western India, and the alluvial Sundarbans delta, which India shares with Bangladesh. India has two archipelagos: the Lakshadweep,
coral atolls off India's
south-western coast; and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a volcanic chain in
the Andaman Sea.
The Indian climate is
strongly influenced by the Himalayas and the Thar Desert,
both of which drive the economically and culturally pivotal summer and winter monsoons.
The Himalayas prevent cold Central Asian katabatic
winds from blowing in, keeping the bulk of the Indian subcontinent warmer than
most locations at similar latitudes. The Thar Desert plays a crucial role in
attracting the moisture-laden southwest summer monsoon winds that, between June
and October, provide the majority of India's rainfall. Four
major climatic groupings predominate in India: tropical wet, tropical dry, subtropical
humid, and montane.
Politics
India is the world's most populous
democracy. A parliamentary republic with a multi-party system, it has six recognized
national parties, including the Indian National Congress and the Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP), and more than 40 regional parties. The Congress is
considered centre-left or "liberal" in Indian political culture and
the BJP centre-right or "conservative". For most of the period
between 1950—when India
first became a republic—and the late 1980s, the Congress held a majority in the
parliament. Since then, however, it has increasingly shared the political stage
with the BJP, as well as with powerful regional parties which have often forced
the creation of multi-party coalitions at the Centre.
In the Republic of India's
first three general elections, in 1951, 1957, and 1962, the Jawaharlal Nehru-led
Congress won easy victories. On Nehru's death in 1964, Lal Bahadur Shastri
briefly became prime minister; he was succeeded, after his own unexpected death
in 1966, by Indira Gandhi, who went on to lead the Congress to election
victories in 1967 and 1971. Following public discontent with the state of
emergency she declared in 1975, the Congress was voted out of power in 1977;
the just-created Janata Party, which had opposed the emergency, was voted in.
Its government lasted just over three years. Voted back into power in 1980, the
Congress saw a change in leadership in 1984, when Indira Gandhi was
assassinated; she was succeeded by her son Rajiv Gandhi, who won an easy
victory in the general elections later that year. The Congress was voted out
again in 1989 when a National Front coalition, led by the newly formed Janata
Dal in alliance with the Left Front, won the elections; that government too
proved relatively short-lived: it lasted just under two years. Elections were
held again in 1991; no party won an absolute majority. But the Congress, as the
largest single party, was able to form a minority government led by P.V.
Narasimha Rao.
The two years after the
general election of 1996 were marked by political turmoil. Several short-lived
alliances shared power at the Centre. The BJP formed a government briefly in
1996; it was followed by two comparatively long-lasting United Front
coalitions, which depended on external support. In 1998, the BJP was able to
form a successful coalition, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which
under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, became the first non-Congress
government to complete a full five-year term. In the 2004 Indian general
elections, again no party won an absolute majority, but the Congress emerged as
the largest single party, forming a successful coalition: the United
Progressive Alliance (UPA). It had the support of left-leaning parties and MPs
opposed to the BJP. The UPA coalition was returned to power in the 2009 general
election with increased numbers, and it no longer required external support
from India's
Communist parties. That year, Manmohan Singh became the first prime minister
since Jawaharlal Nehru in 1957 and 1962 to be re-elected to a second
consecutive five-year term.
About The India Government
India is a federation with a parliamentary system governed under the Constitution
of India, which serves as the country's supreme legal document. It is a constitutional
republic and representative democracy, in which "majority rule is tempered
by minority rights protected by law". Federalism in India defines
the power distribution between the federal government and the states. The
government abides by constitutional checks and balances. The Constitution of
India, which came into effect on 26 January 1950, states in its preamble
that India
is a sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic republic. India's form of
government, traditionally described as "quasi-federal" with a strong
centre and weak states, has grown increasingly federal since the late 1990s as
a result of political, economic, and social changes.
The federal government
comprises three branches:
Executive: The President of India is the head of state who is elected
indirectly by a national electoral college for a five-year term. The
Prime Minister of India is the head of government and exercises most executive
power. Appointed by the president, the prime minister is
by convention supported by the party or political alliance holding the majority
of seats in the lower house of parliament. The executive branch of
the Indian government consists of the president, the vice-president, and the
Council of Ministers—the cabinet being its executive committee—headed by the
prime minister. Any minister holding a portfolio must be a member of one of the
houses of parliament. In the Indian parliamentary system, the
executive is subordinate to the legislature; the prime minister and his council
directly responsible to the lower house of the parliament.
Legislative:
The legislature of India
is the bicameral parliament. It operates under a Westminster-style
parliamentary system and comprises the upper house called the Rajya Sabha
("Council of States") and the lower called the Lok Sabha ("House
of the People"). The Rajya Sabha is a permanent body that has
245 members who serve in staggered six-year terms. Most are elected
indirectly by the state and territorial legislatures in numbers proportional to
their state's share of the national population. Except two members
of the Lok Sabha, all 543 members are directly elected by people all over India voting;
they represent individual constituencies via five-year terms. The
remaining two members are nominated by the president from among the Anglo-Indian
community, in case the president decides that they are not adequately
represented.
Judicial: India
has a unitary three-tier judiciary, consisting of the Supreme Court, headed by the
Chief Justice of India, 21 High Courts, and a large number of trial courts. The
Supreme Court has original jurisdiction over cases involving fundamental rights
and over disputes between states and the Centre; it has appellate jurisdiction
over the High Courts. It is judicially independent and has the power both to
declare the law and to strike down union or state laws which contravene the
constitution. The Supreme Court is also the ultimate interpreter of the
constitution.
Divisions
India is a federation composed of 28 states and 7 union territories. All
states, as well as the union territories of Pondicherry and the National
Capital Territory of Delhi, have elected legislatures and governments, both
patterned on the Westminster model. The remaining five union territories are
directly ruled by the Centre through appointed administrators. In 1956, under
the States Reorganization Act, states were reorganized on a linguistic basis.
Since then, their structure has remained largely unchanged. Each state or union
territory is further divided into administrative districts. The districts in
turn are further divided into tehsils and ultimately into villages.
States:
- Andhra Pradesh
- Arunachal Pradesh
- Assam
- Bihar
- Chhattisgarh
- Goa
- Gujarat
|
- Haryana
- Himachal Pradesh
- Jammu and
Kashmir
- Jharkhand
- Karnataka
- Kerala
- Madhya Pradesh
|
- Maharashtra
- Manipur
- Meghalaya
- Mizoram
- Nagaland
- Orissa
- Punjab
|
- Rajasthan
- Sikkim
- Tamil Nadu
- Tripura
- Uttar Pradesh
- Uttarakhand
- West Bengal
|
Union territories:
- Andaman and Nicobar
Islands
- Chandigarh
- Dadra and Nagar Haveli
- Daman and Diu
- Lakshadweep
- National Capital
Territory of Delhi
- Pondicherry
|
Arts
and Culture
The Taj
Mahal was built in Agra
by Shah Jahan, a Mughal emperor, as a memorial to his deceased wife Mumtaz
Mahal.
Indian cultural history
spans more than 4,500 years. During the Vedic age (c. 1700–500 BCE), the
foundations of Hindu philosophy, mythology and literature were laid, and many
beliefs and practices which still exist today, such as dhárma, kárma, yóga, and
mokṣa, were established. India is notable for its religious
diversity, with Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam, Christianity, and Jainism among the
nation's major religions. The predominant religion, Hinduism, has been shaped
by various historical schools of thought, including those of the Upanishads,
the Yoga Sutras, the Bhakti movement, and by Buddhist philosophy.
Indian architecture is
highly diverse. Much of it, including notable monuments such as the Taj Mahal
and other examples of Mughal architecture and South Indian architecture,
comprises a blend of ancient and varied local traditions from several parts of
the country and abroad. Vernacular architecture also displays
notable regional variation. Indian cuisine is best known for its delicate use
of herbs and spices and for its tandoori grilling techniques. The tandoor, a
clay oven in use for almost 5,000 years in India, is known for its ability to
grill meats to an "uncommon succulence" and for the puffy flatbread
known as the naan.The staple foods in the region are rice (especially in the
south and the east), wheat (predominantly in the north) and lentils. Many
spices which have worldwide appeal are originally native to the Indian
subcontinent, while chili pepper, native to the Americas and introduced by the Portuguese,
is widely used in Indian cuisine.
The earliest literary
writings in India
composed between 1,400 BCE and 1,200 AD were in the Sanskrit language.
Prominent works of this Sanskrit literature include epics such as the Mahabharata
and the Ramayana, the dramas of Kālidāsa such as the Abhijñānaśākuntalam
(The Recognition of Śakuntalā), and poetry such as the Mahākāvya.
Developed between 600 BCE and 300 AD in Southern India,
the Sangam literature consisting of 2,381 poems is regarded as a
predecessor of Tamil literature. From the 14th century AD to 18th century AD, India's
literary traditions went through a period of drastic change because of the
emergence of devotional poets such as Kabīr, Tulsīdās, and Guru Nānak. This
period was characterized by varied and wide spectrum of thought and expression;
as a consequence, medieval Indian literary works differed significantly from
classical traditions. In the 19th century, Indian writers took a new interest
in social questions and psychological descriptions. Twentieth-century Indian
literature was influenced by the works of Bengali poet and novelist Rabindranath
Tagore.
Dance and Music
Indian music ranges over
various traditions and regional styles. Classical music encompasses two genres
and their various folk offshoots: the northern Hindustani and southern Carnatic
schools. Regionalized popular forms include filmy and folk music; the syncretic
tradition of the bauls is a well-known form of the latter. Indian dance
also features diverse folk and classical forms. Among the better-known
folk dances are the bhangra of the Punjab, the bihu of Assam, the chhau of West Bengal and
Jharkhand, Sambalpuri of Orissa, ghoomar of Rajasthan, and the Lavani
of Maharashtra. Eight dance forms, many with
narrative forms and mythological elements, have been accorded classical dance
status by India's
National Academy of Music, Dance, and Drama. These are: bharatanatyam of
the state of Tamil Nadu, kathak of Uttar Pradesh, kathakali and mohiniyattam
of Kerala, kuchipudi of Andhra Pradesh, Manipuri of Manipur, Odissi
of Orissa, and the sattriya of Assam.
Theatre in India melds
music, dance, and improvised or written dialogue. Often based on Hindu mythology, but also
borrowing from medieval romances or social and political events, Indian theatre
includes the bhavai of Gujarat, the jatra of West Bengal, the nautanki
and ramlila of North India, tamasha of Maharashtra, burrakatha
of Andhra Pradesh, terukkuttu of Tamil Nadu, and the yakshagana
of Karnataka. The Indian film industry is the world's most-watched film
industry. Established regional cinematic traditions exist in the Assamese, Bengali,
Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Odia, Tamil, and Telugu languages. South
Indian cinema attracts more than 75% of national film revenue.
Social
Life and Festivals
Traditional Indian society
is defined by relatively strict social hierarchy. The Indian caste system
embodies much of the social stratification and many of the social restrictions
found in the Indian subcontinent. Social classes are defined by thousands of
endogamous hereditary groups, often termed as jātis, or
"castes". Most Dalits ("Untouchables") and members of other
lower-caste communities continue to live in segregation and often face persecution
and discrimination. Traditional Indian family values are highly valued, and
multi-generational patriarchal joint families have been the norm in India, though
nuclear families are becoming common in urban areas. An overwhelming
majority of Indians, with their consent, have their marriages arranged by their
parents or other family members. Marriage is thought to be for life and the
divorce rate is extremely low. Indians maintain a peaceful married life
comparison to rest of the developing countries all over the world.
Many Indian festivals are
religious in origin. As India
supports all religions, various religious festivals of different communities
are observed here. Some of those are Diwali, Ganesh Chaturthi, Thai Pongal, Holi,
Durga Puja, Eid ul-Fitr, Bakr-Id, Christmas, Vaisakhi and many other local
festivals. India
has three national holidays which are observed in all states and union
territories: Republic Day, Independence Day and Gandhi Jayanti. Other sets of
holidays, varying between nine and twelve, are officially observed in
individual states. Traditional Indian dress varies across the regions in its colors
and styles and depends on various factors, including climate. Popular styles of
dress include draped garments such as sari for women and dhoti or lungi for
men; in addition, stitched clothes such as shalwar kameez for women and kurta-pyjama
and European-style trousers and shirts for men are also popular. The
wearing of delicate jewellery, modeled on real flowers worn in ancient India, is part of a tradition dating back some
5,000 years; gemstones are also worn in India as talismans.
