Amazing Facts About India That You Learned In School (And Probably Forgot)

National Flag

Our national flag as we know today wasn’t adopted until 1947.

The first national flag in India is said to have been hoisted on August 7, 1906, in Kolkata. The second flag was hoisted in Paris by Madame Cama and her band of exiled revolutionaries in 1907. The third flag went up in 1917 during our political struggle, and was hoisted by Dr. Annie Besant and Lokmanya Tilak during the Home rule movement.

A resolution was passed in 1931 adopting a tricolor flag as our national flag. Thus, the tricolour flag of the Congress Party eventually became the tricolour flag of Independent India.

National Anthem

Every Indian rises the moment they hear the pride inducing words from our national anthem, leaving all what one is busy with.

All of us have sung the national anthem and since school, stood up every time we heard it. Most of us don’t know more than that it was written and composed by Nobel laureate and mystic poet Ravindranath Tagore.

The false myth that Jana Gana Mana was written and composed by Tagore to praise George the Fourth, who visited India in 1911. The first rendition of the song was during a convention of the Indian National Congress on December 16th, 1911. 'Jana Gana Mana' was performed for the first time in Hamburg on 11th September, 1942. It was officially declared as India's national anthem on 24th January 1950.

Languages

There are a quite a number of languages spoken in India. Some are accepted nationally while others are accepted as dialects of that particular region. More than 1,500 languages are spoken today in India. The languages with the most native speakers are: Hindi, 422 million; Bengali, 83 million; Telugu, 74 million; Marthi, 72 million; and Tamil, 61 million.

Democracy

India is a parliamentary democracy as well as the world’s largest. The Indian Parliament is made up of the 245-member Rajya Sabha called Upper House and the 545-member Lok Sabha called Lower House. The Rajya Sabha is elected by state legislatures for six-year terms, while the Lok Sabha is elected directly by the people to five-year terms.

India’s adoption of democracy in 1947 is by no means its first experiment with this system – the Chola Empire of South India had an electoral system in place around 1,000 years ago. India has the longest constitution in the world with 448 articles, 12 schedules and 94 amendments.

Diversified Culture

India's culture is among the world’s oldest; civilization in India began about 4,500 years ago. Many sources describe it as the first and the supreme culture in the world, according to the All World Gayatri Power (AWGP) organization. With more than 1.3 billion people, it is the second most populous nation after China and different regions are home to their own distinct cultures, language, religion, food and the arts.