India Culture

People
India is probably the only country with the largest and most diverse mixture of races. All the five major racial types - Australoid, Mongoloid, Europoid, Caucasian and Negroid - find representation among the people of India.

History
The history of India is shrouded in antiquity. The country has been thought of as a nation of philosophers with a well-developed and even idyllic society.
Excavations of sites belonging to the Harappan era show that the people lived in brick houses in towns with excellent drainage. One of the oldest scriptures in the world is the four-volume Vedas that many regard as the repository of national thoughts that anticipated some of the modern scientific discoveries.
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.
The Aryans were among the first to arrive in India which was inhabited by the Dravidians. Others who came here included Greeks, Persians, Mughals and even British, Portugese and French.
Over the years there have been many major ruling dynasties like the Shakas, the Kushans, the Maurayas and Guptas.
Nearly every major religion in the world is represented in India which is also the land of the Lord Buddha, Lord Mahavira and Guru Nanak Dev, the founders of Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism.

Languages
India has 17 major languages and 844 different dialects.
The Sanskrit of the Aryan settlers has merged with the earlier Dravidian vernaculars to give rise to new languages. Hindi, spoken by about 45 per cent of the population, is the national language.
English has also been retained as a language for official communication. Indian literature dates back several millennia to the hymns of the vedic Aryans.
The oral tradition nurtured lassical literature, and produced great works of philosophy and religious doctrine. It also accounted for compilations of anecdotes like the Panchatantra and the Jataka tales, as well as epics like the Ramayana and the Mahabharata.
In southern India, the creative energies of the Tamil poets found expression in the great works of Sangam literature.
The epic Tirukkural by Tiruvalluvar is a masterpiece of this age. In the north, dramatists like Kalidasa and Bhasa produced great dramas in Sanskrit.

Festivals
India is a rich land which has attracted invaders from Central Europe and Asia who left their imprint on this land, its religions and its lifestyles over 40 centuries. The Greeks , under Al-exander the great, travelled as far down as the lower Indus River which they mis pronounced as the "Hindu River" Consequently, all the various in vaders, with their conflicting faiths, who inhabited the land of the Indus River were called Hindus and their land, Hindustan. It was shortened to "HIND", then "IND" and finally INDIA.