a brief history of india

[...]... Indians, as Aryans, were part of the master race, not inferior to it Hindu nationalists in the 20th and 21st centuries have challenged the Aryan invasion theory, arguing that Aryan culture was indigenous to India and Aryans were the creators of the ancient Harappan civilization Descendants of these Harappans-cum-Aryans later traveled “out of India, ” spreading the Indo-European language (and Aryan race) into... professions and occupations and created the “unchanging” villages of rural India To such observers caste was a complete anachronism, a system that was anathema to egalitarian and competitive modern (that is to say, European) ways of life Many Western-educated Indians also believed that caste was an outdated system; in the early decades after Indian independence in 1947, such men believed that caste would... about halfway down the subcontinent through low mountain ranges (the Vindhya and the Satpura) into the Arabian Sea The Narmada River and the Vindhya Range are geographical markers separating north and south India South of the Narmada is another ancient geological formation: the high Deccan Plateau The Deccan begins in the Western Ghats, steep hills that rise sharply from the narrow flat coastline and run,... 9 A BRIEF HISTORY OF INDIA Reading the Indus Script H arappan civilization developed a script, but scholars cannot yet read it Harappans carved a line of their script along the top of the square soapstone seals that characterized their society; usually they also carved an animal picture below the writing Archaeologists find these seals in abundance in Harappan settlements Similar to cylindrical seals... that underlie the Earth’s crusts slowly but inexorably 1 A BRIEF HISTORY OF INDIA RAN GE VI YA NDH G moved an island landmass away from its location off the Australian coast and toward the Eurasian continent When this island smashed into Asia (a movement that in itself took some 10 million years), the island’s tectonic plate slid underneath the Eurasian plate, forcing the Eurasian landmass upward and... such as the group that maintains the 21st-century Dalitstan Web site.The Dalitstan Organisation sees Dalits as the original Indian peoples who created the ancient Harappan civilization For Dalitstan, it was the Aryan invaders, the ancestors of today’s Brahmans, who “conquered and enslaved the original inhabitants of India (Ganesan 2001, 1–2) One problem with the “out of India theory, lies in the absence... Arabian Gulf Harappan-style artifacts—seals, beads, dice, ceramics—have been found in sites on the Arabian Sea (Oman) and in Mesopotamia itself Mesopotamian objects (although fewer in number) have also been found at Harappan sites Mesopotamian sources speak of a land called “Meluhha”—some scholars think this was the coastal region of the Indus valley Harappan Culture Harappan civilization developed indigenously... the earliest nor the only human inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent From as early as 30,000 B.C through 4000 B.C., Stone Age communities of hunters and gatherers lived throughout India in regions such as Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, and Bihar Excavations in Baluchistan at the village of Mehrgarh near the Bolan Pass (and close to the Indus River) show that agriculture and the... covered drains carried waste and water along the streets and outside of the settlement areas 11 “Priest-King” from Mohenjo-Daro (Copyright J M Kenoyer, Courtesy Department of Archaeology and Museums, Government of Pakistan) LAND, CLIMATE, AND PREHISTORY While archaeological excavations have provided a great deal of information on the material culture of Harappan civilization, the absence of oral or written... continue to fascinate contemporary scholars, even as modern Hindu nationalists, Dalit (Untouchable) organizations, and Indian secularists debate their significance for contemporary Indian life Borders and Boundaries India is a “subcontinent” a triangular landmass lying below the main Asian continent—bordered on three sides by water: in the east by the Bay of Bengal, in the west by the Arabian Sea, and to . on Ashokan pillar at Lauriya-Nandangarh, Bihar 38 Ajanta cave paintings 42 Jagannatha temple at Puri, Orissa 49 Krishna instructs Arjuna, wall carving at the Birla Mandir, New Delhi 51 Portrait. 128 Jorasanko Thakurbari, Calcutta 129 Sadharan Brahmo Samaj temple, Calcutta 136 The Dance of the Emancipated Bengalee Lady, Gaganendranath Tagore, c. 1921 140 Dadabhai Naoroji 156 The science of. hierarchy of professions and occupations and created the “unchanging” villages of rural India. To such observers caste was a complete anachronism, a system that was anathema to egalitarian and