Facts About India... contd.

India has 3.5 million professionals trained in medicine or other technical sciences. Ranking India as one of the ten largest emerging markets in the world.

India has one of the largest middle classes in the world nearly 250 million people which is the total population of the United States.

Perhaps the most popular of all India's culinary exports, the curry was recently named as the most popular dish in Britain. Curry derives it's name from 'kadi', the Tamil word for sabzi (or vegetable). In some parts of the world, going for a 'curry and a beer' are an intrinsic part of a good 'night out'.

The dowry system was originally created in the days when Hindu women had no right to inheritance by law. This was the only way parents could insure that her daughter would have some property of her own. Even her husband had no claim on this property. Arranged marriages was the practice where elders of the family made marriage decisions for their children at a time when children were married at a very young age. Today, families merely introduce youngsters and no demands are made of them. The word arranged has become a misnomer.

The red dot(BINDI) used to be worn on the forehead of married women as a sign of matrimony (similar to wedding bands here). Nowadays, Bindis are very advanced.

On January 26, 1950 India adopted its Constitution which declared India as a sovereign, socialist, secular republic. India follows a two-tiered parliamentary system. The Parliament consists of the President of India and the two houses: Lok Sabha (House of the People) comprised of elected representatives from the states and Rajya Sabha (Council of the States) comprised of appointed representatives.

India is a country with probably 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, who are mainly a mixed race.

Kamasutra, This ancient text on sexual love, was written by Vatsyayana in the mid-4th century. The text was made accessible to the English-speaking world by the orientalist Sir Richard Burton. It is essentially a philosophy on love and how to achieve happy and harmonius relationships, especially between husband and wife.

One of the most enduring symbols of India is the figure of Shiv Nataraj or the dancing Shiva. Shiva's cosmic dance is believed to encompass creation, preservation, and destruction and this idea has been embedded in Hindu thought and ritual since the dawn of civilisation.

Films arrived in India less than a year after the Lumieres first exhibited their cinematographie in Paris. On July 7, 1896, an agent who had brought equipment and films from France first showed his moving pictures in Bombay. That was an important day in the social and cultural history of the Indian people.
The first Indian-made feature film (3700 feet long) was released in 1913. It was made by Dadasaheb Phalke and was called Raja Harishchandra. Based on a story from the Mahabharata it was a stirring film concerned with honour, sacrifice and mighty deeds. From then on many "mythologicals" were made and took India by storm. Phalke's company alone produced about a hundred films.
India's mastery of the science of pure mathematics goes back to ancient times. It is generally acknowledged that the concept of zero, crucial to the development of the science, is India's contribution to the world, which was given to Europe through the Arabs. In the Ganita Sara Samgraha, 850 A.D., Mahaviracharya, the greatest Jain mathematician mentions the significance of zero. In the fifth century BC Brahmagupta became the first mathematician to solve the Pellian equation. A century later, Aryabhatta arrived at the most accurate value of the mathematical constant, Pi, in the Gitikapada. The Bakhsali manuscript, written in the third or fourth century BC, on 72 leaves of birch bark, is an exclusively mathematical text that presents rules, illustrated instances and solutions to geometric, algebraic and arithmetical problems. In the Kalpasutras, penned in 290 BC, Bhadrabahu solved the Pythagorean theorem. The mathematical genius of the Jains was so developed that their highest numeral was a forerunner of the Alef zero of modern-day mathematics.

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Links to more facts and figures:

India Facts and Figures from Encarta
CIA, The World Fact Book, INDIA