2 days ago when I was asking about “what keeps the country together” only one thought came to my mind:Indians don’t even have a name for their country, religion or region.
There was a river flowing at the Eastern Boundary of the Persian Empire which the Indians called Sindh. The Muslims called it Hind (and hence the name Hindu (which is the name of the main religion of India) and Hindustan (which is what the Indians call their country). The Europeans (esp. the French) pronounced this region Inde which the British called as India and the river as Indus.
Incidentally no portion of the river Indus flows in India anymore. When the Europeans took to the sea, they started labeling almost every new culture as Indians, irrespective of whether they had any ties with India or not. So now many races in Northern and Southern America are also called Indians even though they bear no resemblance.
True. There was no India ever. It came into a piece with the boundaries and all after the British came here.
Before that it was thousands of princely states and kingdoms.
Comment by Xylene — November 23, 2009 @ 5:12 pm
atleast one thing is there…. if british were not here i doubt if there was ever a United India as big and as strong as today.
(this does not mean that i like british ruling us)
Comment by Ankur Aggarwal — November 23, 2009 @ 6:43 pm
The Europeans did not give the name Indians to everyone. Only the Native Americans are called Indians. That is because when Columbus discovered America, he was actually looking for India and thought he had reached India. So, they started calling the Native Americans as Indians.
Comment by Chaitanya — January 8, 2011 @ 1:46 am
The statement – “no portion of the Indus flows in India anymore” – is wrong. Take a look at the map. Leh is very close to the Indus.
Comment by T.R.Ramaswami — January 17, 2011 @ 4:15 pm
as you yourself mentioned leh is very close to the indus borders. However if you look at the line of control only one of the tributries actully fall under indiaŘs control.
I would appreciate if you could share some more of your research withus
Comment by ankur — January 17, 2011 @ 6:35 pm
Take a good map of India The main Indus river starts from near Manasarovar and enters India via Demchok, Dungti, Chushul etc. etc. All this is India controlled. Leh is about 10 km NORTH of the river at the closest point. Indus is within India for about 300 km. and Leh is about 70 km west from the LAC with China. Indus flows into PoK about 20 km north-east of Kargil.
Do a Google search with the words ” Line of actual control in Kashmir” and see the map.
Comment by T.R.Ramaswami — January 18, 2011 @ 2:17 pm