Civilization 
The roots of Indian civilization stretch back in time to pre-recorded history. The earliest human activity in the Indian sub-continent can be traced back to the Early, Middle and Late Stone Ages (400,000-200,000 BC). Implements from all three periods have been found from Rajasthan, Gujarat, Bihar, parts of what is now Pakistan and the southern most tip of the Indian Peninsula.


The earliest known civilization in India, the starting point in its history, dates back to about 3000 BC. Discovered in the 1920s, it was thought to have been confined to the valley of the river Indus, hence the name given to it was Indus Valley civilization. This civilization was a highly developed urban one, and two of its towns, Mohenjodaro and Harappa, represent the high watermark of the settlements. The Archaeological excavations at Mohenjo-daro and Harappa reveal that the people lived in brick houses and had wells, bathrooms, drainage systems, and well-made household utensils and copper weapons. Subsequent archaeological excavations established that the contours of this civilization were not restricted to the Indus valley but spread to a wide area in northwestern and western India. Thus this civilization is now better known as the Harappan civilization. Mohenjodaro and Harappa are now in Pakistan and the principal sites in India include Ropar in Punjab, Lothal in Gujarat and Kalibangan in Rajasthan.

Succession of Foreigners 
Despite formidable barriers in the form of the mighty Himalayas and oceans, India also received a succession of foreigners, many of them carrying swords and guns. But nearly all of them stayed on. Out of these waves of immigration has emerged the composite culture of India and made it a land of unity in diversity. India became a land of assimilation and learning, a land of change and continuity. Foreigners who came to India included Aryans, Greeks, Persians, Mughal and even British, Portuguese and French. Over the years there have been many major ruling dynasties like the Shakas, the Kushans, the Maurayas and Guptas.

Aryans 
The Aryans were among the first to arrive in India (around 1500 BC), which was inhabited by the Dravidians, and they said to have entered India through the fabled Khyber pass. They intermingled with the local population, and assimilated themselves into the social framework. They adopted the settled agricultural lifestyle of their predecessors, and established small agrarian communities across the state of Punjab.

The Aryans are believed to have brought with them the horse, developed the Sanskrit language and made significant inroads in to the religion of the times. All three factors were to play a fundamental role in the shaping of Indian culture. Cavalry warfare facilitated the rapid spread of Aryan culture across North India, and allowed the emergence of large empires. By the 6th century BC at least 16 Aryan states had been established south of the Himalayas,


The Aryans did not have a script, but they developed a rich tradition. They composed the hymns of the four Vedas, the great philosophic poems that are at the heart of Hindu thought.

The events described in the two great Indian epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, are thought to have occurred around this period. (1000 to 800 BC).

Mauryans 

By the end of the third century BC, most of North India was knit together in the first great Indian empire by Chandragupta Maurya. His son Bindusara extended the Mauryan empire over virtually the entire subcontinent, giving rise to an imperial vision that was to dominate successive centuries of political aspirations. The greatest Mauryan emperor was Ashoka the Great (286-231 BC) whose successful campaigns culminated in the annexation of Kalinga (modern Orissa) and the Mouryan empire began to break up shortly after his death.

Overcome by the horrors of war, Ahoka was probably the first victorious ruler to renounce war on the battlefield. Ashoka converted to Buddhism, but did not impose his faith on his subjects. Instead, he tried to convert them through edicts inscribed on rock in the local dialects, using the earliest known post-Harappan script known as Brahmi.

Guptas 

Candra Gupta 1, who reigned from AD 320 to 330, was the founder of the imperial dynasty of the Guptas, which flourished until the mid-6th century. It covered a large part of the Indian subcontinent, but its administration was more decentralised than that of the Mauryas. Alternately waging war and entering into matrimonial alliances with the smaller kingdoms in its neighbourhood, the empire's boundaries kept fluctuating with each ruler.

The Gupta Dynasty marked the peak of classical Indian civilization. The invasions of the White Huns signalled the end of this era of history, although at first, they were defeated by the Guptas. After the decline of the Gupta empire, north India broke into a number of separate Hindu kingdoms and was not really unified again until the coming of the Muslims.

The Southern Kingdoms 
While kingdoms rose and fell in the north of India, the south remained generally unaffected by these upheavals. Religions like Jainism and Buddhism gradually became popular in the centre and north of India, but Hinduism continued to flourish in the south.

The prosperity in the southern parts of the country was based upon the long-established trade links of India with other civilisations. The Egyptians and Romans had trade relations with southern India through sea routes and later, links were also established with South-East Asia. Other outside influences in the south included the arrival of Saint Thomas in Kerala in 52 AD, who brought Christianity to India.


Great dynasties that rose in the south were the Cholas, Pandyas, Cheras, Chalukyas and Pallavas. These empires constantly vied with each other for supremacy. The Chalukyas ruled mainly over the Deccan region of central India, although at times, their reign extended further north. Further south, the Pallavas pioneered Dravidian architecture with its exuberant, almost baroque style. They also took Indian art forms and Hinduism to Java in Indonesia, Thailand and Cambodia.

In 850 AD, the Cholas rose to power and gradually superseded the Pallavas. They too were great builders, and their architectural styles can be witnessed at the temples in Thanjavur. Under the rule of Raja Raja Chola, the Chola empire spread all over southern India, the Deccan, Sri Lanka, parts of the Malay peninsula and Sumatra.

In Kerala, the Cheras acted host to an influx of Arab traders who had discovered a fast sea route to India using the monsoon winds. Some of them settled here permanently, and were allowed to freely practice their religion.

Advent of the Muslims 

The Delhi Sultanate
An event of immense and lasting impact in Indian history was the advent of the Muslims in the north-west. Lured by tales of the fertile plains of the Punjab and the fabulous wealth of Hindu temples, Mahmud of Ghazni first attacked India in 1000 AD. Other raiders from Central Asia followed him, but these invasions were no more than banditry. It was only in 1192 that Muslim power arrived in India on a permanent basis. In that year, Mohammed of Ghori, who had been expanding his power all across the Punjab broke into India and took Ajmer. The following year his general Qutb-ud-din Aibak took Varanasi and Delhi and after Mohammed Ghori's death in 1206, he became the first of the Sultans of Delhi. Qutb-ud-din Aibak founded the so called Slave Dynasty in India at Delhi, setting up the nucleus of the Delhi Sultanate, or the rule of Turkish and Afghan sultans, the Khiljis, the Tughlaqs and the Lodis.

The Great Mughals
The most important Islamic empire was that of the Mughals, a Central Asian dynasty founded by Babur early in the sixteenth century. Babur was succeeded by his son Humayun and under the reign of Humayun's son , Akbar the Great (1562-1605), Indo-Islamic culture attained a peak of tolerance, harmony and a spirit of enquiry.

The nobles of his court belonged to both the Hindu and the Muslim faiths, and Akbar himself married a Hindu princess. Leaders of all the faiths were invited to his court at Fatehpur Sikri to debate religious issues at the specially built 'Ibadat Khana'. Akbar tried to consolidate religious tolerance by founding the Din-e-Ilahi religion, an amalgam of the Hindu and the Muslim faiths.

Mughal culture reached its zenith during the reign of Akbar's grandson Shahjehan, a great builder and patron of the arts. Shahjehan moved his capital to Delhi and built the incomparable Taj Mahal at Agra.

Aurangzeb, the last major Mughal, extended his empire over all but the southern tip of India, though he was constantly harried by Rajput and Maratha clans.

The Marathas 
The power that came closest to imperial pretensions was that of the Marathas. Starting from scratch, the non-Brahmin castes in the Maharashtra region had been organised into a fighting force by their legendary leader, Shivaji. Dimunitive in height, clever beyond his enemy's imagination, Shivaji led everyday of his life like a drama in which he was always a step ahead of his adversaries. The Marathas moved like lightning and appeared in areas where least expected, at times hundreds of miles away from their home. They always went back with their hands full of plunder.

Gradually, states began to pay them vast amounts in "protection money," insurance aginst their plundering raids. By the third quarter of the 18th century, the Marathas had under their direct administration or indirect subjection enough Indian territory to justify use of the term "the Maratha Empire", though it never came near the dimensions of the Mughal empire. The Marathas also never sought to formally substitute themselves for the Mughals; they often kept the emperor under their thumb but paid him formal obeisance.

When Nadir Shah of Persia attacked Delhi in 1739, the declining Mughals were even further weakened, but the expansion of the Maratha power came to an abrupt halt in 1761 at Panipat. There the Marathas were defeated by Ahmad Shah Durrani from Afganisthan. Their expansion to the west halted, they nevertheless consolidated their control over central India and their region known as Malwa. Soon, however, they were to fall to India's final imperial power, the British.

Advent of the Europeans 
The next arrival of overwhelming political importance was that of the Europeans. The great seafarers of north-west Europe, the British, French, Dutch and Portuguese, arrived early in the seventeenth century and established trading outposts along the coasts. The spices of Malabar (in Kerala) had attracted the Portuguese as early as the end of the 15th century when, in 1498, Vasco da Gama had landed at Calicut, sailing via the Cape of Good Hope. Early in the 16th Century, the Portuguese had already established their colony in Goa; but their territorial and commercial hold in India remained rather limited. During the late 16th and 17th century they remained unrivalled as pirates on the high seas; but inland the other European companies were making their presence felt, though entirely in commercial terms.

The Years of The Raj 
The newcomers soon developed rivalries among themselves and allied with local rulers to consolidate their positions against each other militarily. In time they developed territorial and political ambitions of their own and manipulated local rivalries and enmities to their own advantage. The ultimate victors were the British, who established political supremacy over eastern India after the Battle of Plassey in 1757. They gradually extended their rule over the entire subcontinent, either by direct annexation, or by exercising suzerainty over local rajas and nawabs.

Unlike all former rulers, the British did not settle in India to form a new local empire. The English East India Company continued its commercial activities and India became 'the Jewel in the Crown' of the British empire, giving an enormous boost to the nascent Industrial Revolution by providing cheap raw materials, capital and a large captive market for British industry. The land was reorganised under the harsh Zamindari system to facilitate the collection of taxes to enrich British coffers. In certain areas farmers were forced to switch from subsistence farming to commercial crops such as indigo, jute, coffee and tea. This resulted in several famines of unprecedented scale.

In the first half of the 19th century, the British extended their hold over many Indian territories. A large part of the subcontinent was brought under the Company's direct administration; in some parts local rulers were retained as subsidiaries of the Company, militarily and administratively completely at its mercy and yilelding to it an overwhelming portion of the revenues. By 1857, "the British empire in India had become the British empire of India." The means employed to achieve this were unrestrained and no scruple was allowed to interfere with the imperial ambition.

The Struggle for Independence 

The First War of Independence or The Mutiny of Sepoys
A century of accumulated grievances erupted in the Indian mutiny of sepoys in the British army, in 1857. This was the signal for a spontaneous conflagration, in which the princely rulers, landed aristocarcy and peasantry rallied against the British around the person of the last Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah. The uprising, however, was eventually brutally supressed. By the end of 1859, the "emperor" had been deported to Burma where he died a lonely death, bringing to a formal end the era of Mughal rule in India.

The Mutiny, even in its failure, produced many heroes and heroines of epic character. Above all, it produced a sense of unity between the Hindus and the Muslims of India that was to be witnessed in later years.

The rebellion also saw the end of the East India Company's rule in India. Power was transferred to the British Crown in 1858 by an Act of British Parliament. The Crown's viceroy in India was to be the chief executive.

Freedom Struggle 
The British empire contained within itself the seeds of its own destruction. The British constructed a vast railway network across the entire land in order to facilitate the transport of raw materials to the ports for export. This gave intangible form to the idea of Indian unity by physically bringing all the peoples of the subcontinent within easy reach of each other.

During World War 1 Indian troops served the British loyally, but nationalist agitation increased afterward. The British Parliament passed a reform act in 1919, providing for provincial councils of Indians with some powers of supervision over agriculture, education, and public health. Far from satisfied, the extreme nationalists, led by Mohandas K. Gandhi, gained control of the Congress. Gandhi preached resistance to the British by "noncooperation". Hundreds of thousands joined his civil disobediencecampaigns. The Congress party quickly gained a mass following.

Rioting broke out when Parliament placed no Indians on the Simon Commission, appointed in 1927 to investigate the government of India. The British imprisoned Gandhi and his associates. In 1929 Jawaharlal Nehru was elected president of the Congress. Like Gandhi, Nehru was passionately devoted to the cause of freedom. He had absorbed Western ideas at Harrow and Cambridge, however, and, unlike Gandhi, wanted to bring modern technology and industrialization to India.

After three "round-table" conferences in London had considered the commission's report. Parliament passed a new Government of India Act in 1935. It provided for elected legislatures in the provinces, but property and educational requirements restricted the number of voters to about 14 percent of tlie population. To protect the interests of minorities, voting was by communal groups. Upper-caste Hindus, Untouchables, Muslims, Sikhs, and others voted for their own candidates. The system perpetuated religious strife. Mohammed Ali Jinnah, leader of the Muslim League, charged that Congress ministries mistreated their Muslim minorities (see Jinnah). He agitated for the separation of the Muslim provinces (rom India and thecreation of a state called Pakistan, which means "country of the pure." When World War II broke out, the Congress demanded complete and immediate freedom for India as tlie price (or India's active participation. In 1942 Sir Stafford Crippswent to India with a plan for granting dominion status after tlie war, but Indian leaders could not agree on the terms. The Congress insisted on a unified India. The Muslim League demanded a separate Pakistan. The princes were determined to preserve their states.

The Japanese invaded northeast India from Burma with a small force in the spring of 1944. It was quickly driven out. In spite of opposition to British rule, India raised a volunteer army of nearly 2.5 million. Its industries expanded greatly to supply arms and other goods for the war effort.

Independence 
India achieved independence on August 15,1947. Giving voice to the sentiments of the nation, the country's first prime minister, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru said, "Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we will redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance .... We end today a period of ill fortune, and India discovers herself again."

The progress and triumph of the Indian Freedom movement was one of the most significant historical processes of the twentieth century. Its repercussions extended far beyond its immediate political consequences. Within the country, it initiated the reordering of political, social and economic power. In the international context, it sounded the death knell of British Imperialism, and changed the political face of the globe.

Posted in Labels: HISTORY