Key Points

At a very early time, the region between the Himalayas and the two seas achieved complete spiritual and cultural unity. This unity became fundamental to the life of the great surge of humanity in this area.

The Rig Veda, India's most ancient text, refers to the northwest region of the Subcontinent as 'Sapta Sindhava'. This term means 'the land of the seven rivers', derived from 'Sindhu' for the Indus River.

The Mahabharata lists many regions within India, such as Kashmir, Kurukshetra, and Kerala. It also uses the terms 'Bhāratavarṣha' and 'Jambudvīpa' to refer to the entire Indian Subcontinent.

'Bhāratavarṣha' means 'the country of the Bharatas'. 'Bharata' was a name that first appeared in the Rig Veda referring to a main Vedic group of people, and later to several kings.

'Jambudvīpa' translates to 'the island of the fruit of the jamun tree', a common tree native to India. This term came to mean the Indian Subcontinent.

Emperor Aśhoka, around 250 BCE, used the name 'Jambudvīpa' to describe the whole of India. At that time, it included present-day Bangladesh, Pakistan, and parts of Afghanistan.

A few centuries later, 'Bhārata' became the generally used name for the Indian Subcontinent. The Viṣhṇu Purāṇa describes Bhārata as the country north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains.

Ancient Tamil literature, from about 2,000 years ago, describes a king whose name was known from Cape Kumari in the south to the great mountain in the north, and from the oceans on the east and west. This shows ancient Indians knew their geography well.

The Indian Constitution begins with the phrase 'India, that is Bharat' in English. The Hindi version similarly states 'Bhārat arthāth India', acknowledging both names for the nation.

The ancient Persians, in the 6th century BCE, referred to the Indus River region as 'Hind', 'Hidu', or 'Hindu'. These were adaptations of 'Sindhu' and were purely geographical terms, not religious.

Based on Persian sources, the ancient Greeks named the region 'Indoi' or 'Indike'. They dropped the initial 'h' from 'Hindu' because that letter did not exist in their language.

The ancient Chinese referred to India as 'Yintu' or 'Yindu', words also derived from 'Sindhu'. Another Chinese term, 'Tianzhu', meant 'heavenly master', reflecting respect for India.

The term 'Hindustān' first appeared in a Persian inscription approximately 1,800 years ago. It later became the common term used by most invaders to describe the Indian Subcontinent.

A Constitution is a document that spells out the basic principles and laws of a nation. The Indian Constitution came into force in 1950.