India

Region: South Asia

Official language: Hindi, English, and fourteen other official languages

Population: 1,409,128,296 (2024 est.)

Nationality: Indian(s) (noun), Indian (adjective)

Land area: 2,973,193 sq km (1,147,956 sq miles)

Water area: 314,070 sq km (121,263 sq miles)

Capital: New Delhi

National anthem: "Jana-Gana-Mana" (Thou Art the Ruler of the Minds of All People), by Rabindranath Tagore

National holiday: Republic Day, January 26 (1950)

Population growth: 0.72% (2024 est.)

Time zone: UTC +5.5

Flag: The flag of India features three horizontal bands of color: saffron (top), which represents sacrifice and courage; white (middle), which represents purity; and green (bottom), which represents faith. In the center of the white band is a blue chakra, a wheel with twenty-four spokes that is meant to symbolize the wheel of life and death.

Independence: August 15, 1947 (from the UK)

Government type: federal republic

Suffrage: 18 years of age; universal

Legal system: common law system based on the English model; separate personal law codes apply to Muslims, Christians, and Hindus; judicial review of legislative acts

India dominates the South Asian subcontinent both in geographical size and population density. With one of the largest populations in the world, India is home to over 1.3 billion people. India borders several other Asian countries, including Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burma, China, Nepal, and Pakistan. In the early twenty-first century, India also ranked as one of the fastest growing economies in the world. People from India are known as Indians.

Note: unless otherwise indicated, statistical data in this article is sourced from the CIA World Factbook, as cited in the bibliography.

People and Culture

Population: There are as many as 1,600 languages and dialects spoken in India. The official language in India is Hindi (in the Devanagari script). However, twenty-two other tongues are approved by the central government as co-official languages.

Based on the 2011 census, Hindi is the primary language for about 43.6 percent of Indian people, though it is spoken and understood by a much larger percentage of the population. Individual states are allowed to designate their own regional languages. The most prevalent of the official languages are Bengali, Telugu, Marathi, Tamil, Urdu, Gujarati, Malayalam, Kannada, Oriya, Punjabi, and Assamese.

English is also an important language in the country and, along with Hindi, is the official language of communication for the national government. It is also important in commercial correspondence. Though there have been efforts to decrease the use of English for official business, this has been unpopular in regions with small Hindi-speaking populations.

Religion is very important in India, and the various religions practiced throughout the country add to its diversity. Hinduism is the most popular, and is practiced by nearly 79.8 percent of the population. However, the religion itself can take many different regional forms. It is speculated that Hinduism is the oldest of the major religions, and that it is the result of interaction between Vedic (or Early Aryan) culture and non-Aryan cultures in the Indus region thousands of years ago. India also has one of the world's largest populations of Muslims, who made up over 14.2 percent of the population in 2011. Other religious groups include Christians, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Zoroastrians (Parsis), Jews, Baha’is, and animists.

The majority of Indian people live outside of large cities. By 2023, 36.4 percent of the population lived in urban areas.

Indigenous People: The original population of India can be traced back nine thousand years to settlements in the Indus Valley. The Indus people developed a sophisticated culture with a complex language, as well as systems of trade and architecture. The Indus Valley civilization reached its pinnacle between 2600 and 1900 BCE.

The Aryans invaded India around 1500 BCE, and it is believed by some scholars that Aryans introduced Sanskrit and the caste system to the region, before eventually moving to Northern India. In 2000, approximately three-quarters of the population was of Indo-Aryan descent.

Education: While education in India is free and compulsory for children aged six to fourteen, school attendance depends a great deal on the resources available in rural communities. Child labor has been another problem affecting attendance and completion rates.

India has done much to address illiteracy, and the country's average literacy rate has improved dramatically. India’s national literacy rate was estimated to be 74.4 percent in 2018.

There are several different types of colleges and universities in India, including government colleges, privately-managed colleges, university colleges, and professional colleges. The primary type of university is the teaching university. Unitary universities are situated on a single campus, while the more common affiliating universities have central campuses that work in conjunction with many other colleges and can span several districts. The largest of these are in Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, and Bangalore.

There are also technical schools at the college level, such as the Indian Institute of Technology, the Indian Institute of Science, and the Institute of Chemical Technology.

Health Care: Health care in India is dispensed primarily through Primary Health Centres (PHC), run by the federal Ministry of Health and Family welfare. Individual states also contribute substantial amounts to health services as well as public health education.

In rural areas especially, most routine medical care is conducted by paramedics and other health care professionals. Serious medical cases are usually referred to larger urban hospitals. India had approximately 0.5 hospital beds per 1,000 people in 2017.

During the mid-1990s, health care spending accounted for about 6 percent of India's gross domestic product (GDP). In 2020, health expenditures accounted for 3 percent of the country's GDP. Most of the expenditure is for primary health care, including curative and preventive costs.

Medical care in India is based both on Western medicine and traditional practices. Ayurveda, which means "life science," is a practice that aims to treat every part of human well-being, including mental, physical, and spiritual components. Practitioners of ayurveda are called vaidya. Unaani is an herbal medical practice, whose practitioners are referred to as hakims (or Muslim physicians).

Food: Indian food covers a broad range of cuisine. Though most recipes use different blends of fresh and dried spices, "curry powder" is never used in authentic Indian recipes. However, some prepackaged spice mixes are used, such as garam masala (a name that translates to "hot spice mix"), which has a number of regional variants. India also has an extensive vegetarian cuisine.

Some common dishes are aloo masala, appam (a rice pancake), southern style baingan bartha (roasted eggplant with curd), biryani (a rice-based dish), dal (a stew of lentils), dosa (a crispy filled crepe), and kashmiri pulao (basmati rice with dried fruits and nuts).

Bread is commonly served with meals. Four common types of bread are baati, chapatti or roti, mudde, and naan. Typical Indian beverages include masala chai (spiced, milky tea), lassi (yogurt shakes), and jal-jeera (a summer drink).

Arts & Entertainment: India is well known for its rich, vibrant culture, especially its music and dance. Indian classical music can be divided into two different groups: the Carnatic form, originating in southern India, and the Hindustani form from the north. Different styles of Indian dance include Bharatanatyam, Odissi, Kuchipudi, Kathak, and Kathakali. Many of these dances follow the storyline of Indian epics.

Indian literature is greatly influenced by the oral tradition. The epic Mahabharata (Great India) is one of the primary texts of Hinduism, and considered one of the longest literary works in the world. Other important religious texts include the Hindu epic the Ramayana, written circa 250 BCE, and the Vedas, or religious scriptures.

In 1913, the Nobel Prize for Literature went to Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore. He was the first Asian to win the prize.

India's capital of New Delhi is home to a large, thriving art scene. Some of the city's most notable galleries and museums include the National Gallery of Modern Art, the Vadehra Art Gallery, the Dhoomimal Art Center, and the Azad Bhawan Gallery.

India has often produced more motion pictures (mostly elaborate musical productions) each year than anywhere else in the world. The center of the Indian film industry is Bombay, often referred to as Bollywood. Other film producing cities include Bengali, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu.

India's national sport is field hockey. Other popular sports are cricket and soccer. Some games that originated in India include the team sport Kabaddi, and gilli-danda, which involves hitting a small piece of wood with a stick.

Holidays: There are many public holidays in India, though there are many regional differences in the observation and celebration of certain holidays. Festivals such as Dussera (September/October) and Diwali (October/November) may be celebrated with parades, fireworks, and other festivities. Indian Muslims, Hindus, and Christians all celebrate the major holidays of their faith. The birthdays of Sikh religious leaders Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind Singh are also widely celebrated.

The secular holidays of Independence Day (August 15), Mahatma Gandhi's birthday (October 2), and Republic Day (January 26) are observed throughout India.

Environment and Geography

Topography: India is the seventh-largest country in the world. With a total area of 3,287,263 square kilometers (1,269,219 square miles), India has 2,973,193 square kilometers (1,147,956 square miles) of land and 314,070 square kilometers (121,263 square miles) of water. India can be divided into three major geographical regions: the mountains of the Himalayas, the Indo-Gangetic Plain, and the southern peninsula of the Deccan Plateau.

The Himalayas, the highest mountain range in the world, are in the northern part of India. In the south, there are plateaus, tropical rain forests, and deserts. The most fertile soil is found in the Indo-Gangetic Plain, where the three main rivers of India (the Ganges, the Brahmaputra, and the Indus) form basins. Other important rivers are the Godavari, Krishna, and Mahanadi. The Arabian Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Bay of Bengal all lie off the coast of India.

The highest point in India is Kanchenjunga ("five treasures of the snow"), on the border with Nepal, at 8,586 meters (28,169 feet). It is the third-highest mountain in the world.

Natural Resources:Coal is a particularly important natural resource in India, and the country possesses one of the largest coal reserves in the world. Other valuable natural resources include iron ore, manganese, mica, bauxite, titanium ore, chromite, natural gas, diamonds, petroleum, limestone, and farmland. However, India faces many pressing environmental issues, including deforestation, soil erosion, overgrazing, air and water pollution, and population growth.

Plants & Animals: Animal life in India is varied. The national animal is the Bengal tiger, which is increasingly threatened by local hunters and encroachments upon its habitat. Other common wild animals in India include the single-horned rhino, Asian elephant, lion, wild buffalo, small cats, deer, monkeys, and wild goats.

More than 1,200 species of birds are found in India, including purple herons, stork-billed kingfishers, gray-headed fish-eagles, crested hawk-eagles, and jungle fowl. There are also hundreds of species of reptiles, including the king cobra, and thousands of different species of insects.

In terms of plant life, there are approximately forty-five thousand different species of plants and shrubs in India. Some native flowers include orchids, rhododendrons, musk rose (Rosa moschata), begonia, balsam (Immpatiens balsamina), and globe amaranth (Gomphrena globosa).

Climate: India has three major seasons. Lasting from March to June, summers in India are very hot in every region of the country. Winter lasts from November to February. Most of the rainfall occurs during the monsoon season between July and October. Natural hazards in India include flash floods, severe thunderstorms, and earthquakes.

Economy

The Indian economy is among the fastest growing in the world. In 2023, India's GDP (purchasing power parity) was estimated at $13.104 trillion, the third-highest in the world; however, the per capita GDP that year was just $9,200, putting it in the bottom half globally. The service industry dominates the economy.

Indian exports in 2023 amounted to an estimated $773.224 billion. The United States, China, and the United Arab Emirates are among India's major trading partners.

Many of India's highly skilled workers speak English and work in the high-technology sector. As a result, India has become a major exporter of software services and workers.

Industry: India's major industries include textiles, chemicals, food processing, steel, transportation equipment, cement, mining, petroleum, machinery, and software. About 49.8 percent of the workforce was employed in the service sector in 2023, while 25 percent worked in manufacturing and other industry.

Agriculture: Agriculture is a dominant force in the Indian economy, employing an estimated 16 percent of the workforce in 2023. An estimated 60.5 percent of the land in India is capable of supporting agriculture (2018 estimate). Key crops include rice, wheat, oilseed, cotton, jute, tea, sugarcane, and potatoes. Cattle, water buffalo, sheep, goats, and poultry are raised as livestock.

Tourism: India has many diverse tourist destinations, and is one of the most popular places to visit in Asia. The Taj Mahal, a gigantic monument built during the seventeenth century in Agra, is among the most-visited sites in India. The frequently visited tourist circuit known as the "Golden Triangle" includes the cities of Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur. In addition, India has many wildlife sanctuaries, including sites in Corbett, Kanha, Sariska, Periyar, Ranthambhor, and Bharatpur.

Government

India achieved independence from the United Kingdom in 1947 and is now the largest democracy in the world. The legal system is structured on English common law. The president and vice president are elected by an electoral college and serve five-year terms. The prime minister, who holds more executive power than the president, recommends the Union Council of Ministers (or cabinet), which is then appointed by the president.

There are two houses in India's parliament: the Council of States (Rajya Sabha) and the People’s Assembly (Lok Sabha). The former consists of 245 seats while the latter consists of 545.

There are twenty-eight states and eight union territories in India.

Interesting Facts

• After the United States, India has the largest number of English speakers in the world. The version of English spoken in India derives from British English.
• Automobile traffic travels on the left side of the road in India, and drivers sit on the right-hand side of the car.
• India is among the world's largest producers of mangoes, the national fruit.

Bibliography

Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Statistics Division. World Statistics Pocketbook. United Nations, series V, no. 43, 2019, unstats.un.org/unsd/publications/pocketbook/files/world-stats-pocketbook-2019.pdf. Accessed 1 Oct. 2020.

"Economic Impact Reports." World Travel and Tourism Council, 2020, wttc.org/Research/Economic-Impact. Accessed 1 Oct. 2020.

"Human Development Insights." Human Development Reports, United Nations Development Programme, hdr.undp.org/data-center/country-insights#/ranks. Accessed 4 Dec. 2024.

"India." 2019 Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor. US Dept. of Labor, www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ILAB/child‗labor‗reports/tda2019/India.pdf. Accessed 1Oct. 2020.

"India." The World Bank, data.worldbank.org/country/india. Accessed 20 Jul. 2022.

"India." The World Factbook, Central Intelligence Agency, 28 Nov. 2023, www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/india/. Accessed 4 Dec. 2024.

"India." World Health Organization, 2019, www.who.int/countries/ind/en/. Accessed 24 July 2019.

“India (IND) Exports, Imports, and Trade Partners.” OEC, Observatory of Economic Complexity, 2020, oec.world/en/profile/country/ind. Accessed 1 Oct. 2020.

“India: Overview of the Education System (EAG 2020).” OECD Education GPS, OECD, 2020, gpseducation.oecd.org/CountryProfile?primaryCountry=IND. Accessed 1 Oct. 2020.

“2019 Report on International Religious Freedom: India.” US Department of State, 2020, www.state.gov/reports/2019-report-on-international-religious-freedom/india. Accessed 1 Oct. 2020.‌