The History of India's Culture

Stone Age rock shelters with paintings in caves in Madhya Pradesh Bhimbetka are the oldest known traces of human life in

India. The first known permanent settlements appeared 9,000 years ago and gradually developed into the Indus Valley

Civilization, dating back to 3400 BC in western India. It was from the Vedic period, the foundations of Hinduism and other

cultural aspects of early Indian society down, and ended in the years 500 BC followed. From around 550 BCE, many independent

kingdoms and republics known as Mahajanapadas established throughout the country.

See in the third century, joined most of South Asia, the Empire Maurya Chandragupta Maurya and flourished under Ashoka the

Great. From the third century AD, the Gupta dynasty initiated the period known as the former "Golden Age of India". Including

kingdom in southern India for the Chalukyas, Cholas and Vijayanagara Empire. Science, technology, engineering, art, logic,

language, literature, mathematics, astronomy, religion and philosophy under the patronage of these kings flourished.

Following invasions from Central Asia between the ages of 10 and 12, much of north India came under the rule of the Sultanate

of Delhi and later the Mughal empire. Under the reign of Akbar the Great, India enjoyed cultural and economic progress and

religious harmony. Mughal emperors gradually expanded their empires to cover large parts of the subcontinent. But in the

northeastern India was the dominant power of the Ahom kingdom of Assam, one of the few rebels Mughal kingdom. The first major

threat to the Mughal imperial power came from a Hindu Rajput king Maha Rana Pratap of Mewar in the 16th Century and after a

Hindu state as Maratha confederacy, the lot of India in the mid-18th Century dominated.

From 16 Century, established European powers like Portugal, the Netherlands, France and the United Kingdom trading post and

later took advantage of internal conflicts in order to establish colonies in the country. In 1856, the largest part of India

is under the control of the British East India Company. A year later, a nationwide insurrection of rebelling military units

and kingdoms, known as the First War of Indian Independence or Sepoy Mutiny, seriously challenged the company's control, but

not with time. As a result of instability, India came under the direct rule of the British crown.

In the 20th Century was called a nationwide struggle for independence from the Indian National Congress and other political

organizations in life. Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi led millions of people in various national campaigns of nonviolent civil

disobedience.

On 15 August 1947, won India its independence from British rule, but also the Muslim majority areas were divided to form an

independent state of Pakistan. On 26 January 1950 India became a republic and joined a new Constitution.

Since independence, India has faced the challenges of religious violence, casteism, Naxalism, terrorism and regional

separatist insurgency, particularly in Jammu and Kashmir and the northeastern India. Since the 1990 terrorist attacks have

affected many cities in India. India has unresolved territorial disputes with the People's Republic of China, conducted in

1962 on the Sino-Indian war, and Pakistan, which resulted in wars in 1947, 1965, 1971 and 1999. India is a founding member of

the United Nations (as British India) and the Movement of Non-Aligned States. In 1974, India conducted an underground nuclear

test, and five more tests in 1998, so that India a nuclear state. Since 1991, significant economic reforms in India turns

into one of the fastest growing economies in the world, increasing its global influence.