India is the world’s largest democracy, with 1.2 billion people.
100 million people come to India’s Kumbh Mela Festival, the world’s biggest gathering of humans. The 2011 Kumbh Mela was the largest gathering of people with over 75 million pilgrims. The gathering was so huge that the crowd was visible from space.
India’s Hindu calendar has 6 seasons: spring, summer, monsoon, autumn, winter and prevernal.
It’s illegal for foreigners to take Indian currency (rupees) out of India. The highest cricket ground in the world. At an altitude of 2,444 meters, the Chail Cricket Ground in Chail, Himachal Pradesh, is the highest in the world. It was built in 1893 and is a part of the Chail Military School.
Shampoo was invented in India, not the commercial liquid ones but the method by use of herbs. The word ‘shampoo’ itself has been derived from the Sanskrit word champu, which means to massage.
India has the largest postal system in the world with more than 150,000 post offices, which is thrice the size of that of China.
India has more than 300,000 active mosques. This outnumbers any other country in the world, even the Muslim countries.
The second largest pool of engineers and scientists is from India.
India is the second largest English speaking country in the world – 125,226,449 numbers of English speakers.India is second only to the USA when it comes to speaking English with around 125 million people speaking the language, which is only 10% of our population. This is expected to grow by quite a margin in the coming years.
Water on the moon was discovered by India. In September 2009, India’s ISRO Chandrayaan- 1 using its Moon Mineralogy Mapper detected water on the moon for the first time.
Science day in Switzerland is dedicated to Ex-Indian President, APJ Abdul Kalam. The father of India’s missile programme had visited Switzerland back in 2006. Upon his arrival, Switzerland declared May 26th as Science Day.
Bollywood is the largest movie industry in terms of output, followed by Nollywood – the movie industry of Nigeria.
Jyoti Kisange Amge is the world’s shortest living woman. She was born on 16 December 1993. She is 62.8 centimeters tall (2 ft 0.6 in.)
Indian railway employs more than a million people, making it the largest employers in the world.
The City Montessori School, in Lucknow, is the world’s largest school in terms of students with over 45,000 inductees.
India is the world’s largest milk producer, with 16 percent of global production, followed by the United States of America, China, Pakistan, and Brazil.
India’s road network is the world’s second largest with 4,865,000 km of roads constructed. (2014).
‘Zero’ in the number system was invented by a mathematician from India. His name was Aryabhatta.
The Human Calculator, Shakuntala Devi is a math prodigy from India. She could calculate 7,686,369,774,870 x 2,465,099,745,779 and provided the correct answer in mere 28 seconds.
Snakes and ladders – the game, was invented in India in the 13th century by a poet saint Gyandev. The ladders represent the virtues while the snakes indicate vices. The game was designed on the basis of the concept that good deeds take you to heaven while bad deeds take you to hell.
90 countries from all over the world buy software from India.
Benaras, now known as Varanasi is the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world. Buddha had also visited it.
More than 54 crore people voted in 2014 general elections. This is more than the entire population of the U.S., U.K., Japan, and Australia combined.
The world’s highest battlefield (Siachin) is controlled by India.
Rabindranath Tagore also wrote the national anthem for Bangladesh. Rabindranath Tagore is credited not only for writing the Indian national anthem, Jana Gana Mana, but the Bangladeshi national anthem, Amar Sonar Bangla, as well. He was also offered knighthood by the British but refused the honour after the Jalianwala Bagh massacre.
Dhyan Chand was offered German citizenship. After defeating Germany 8-1 in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Major Dhyan Chand, the wizard of hockey, was summoned by Hitler. He was promised German citizenship, a high post in the German military and the chance to play for the German national side. Dhyan Chand however declined the offer.
Havell’s is purely an Indian brand & named after its first owner. Though the company was bought for just 10 lakh Rupees a long time ago and is now a multi-billion electrical goods company, it’s an Indian company and is still named after its original owner, Haveli Ram Gupta.
Diamonds were first mined in India. Initially, diamonds were only found in the alluvial deposits in Guntur and Krishna District of the Krishna River Delta. Until diamonds were found in Brazil during the 18th century, India led the world in diamond production.
India’s “Go Air” airline only hires female flight attendants because they are lighter, so they save up to US$500,000 per year in fuel.
It is believed that the first ever diamond recognized and mined was found in India among huge alluvial deposits of the stone on the bank of rivers Krishna and Godavari. Some of the world’s biggest diamonds, today, were also found in India.
