20 facts on India That ever person should know about

20 Facts on India that every person should know about.

"India is the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great-grandmother of tradition. Our most valuable and most instructive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only."

These are not our words. These are the words of the great Mark Twain. And here are 25 Indians facts to support his statement:

Fact 1

India does not have a national language. The official languages used though are Hindi and English. There are 17 major languages used in the regions and 844 dialects.

  

Fact 2

India was one of the richest countries on earth until the British invasion in the early 17th century. India is still a very rich country though and the World Bank ranks India as the country with the tenth highest gross domestic product (GDP).

Fact 3

The most commonly used number system is the Hindu–Arabic numeral system which was invented in India and the Indian scientist Brahmagupta was the person who invented the digit zero.

Fact 4

The wettest inhabited place in the world

Mawsynram, a village on the Khasi Hills, Meghalaya, receives the highest recorded average rainfall in the world. Cherrapunji, also a part of Meghalaya, holds the record for the most rainfall in the calendar year of 1861.

Fact 5

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.

Fact 6

 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.

Fact 7

The biggest and the largest employer in the world is Indian railways employing over a million people.

 

Fact 8

India has the most number of mosques. It has 300,000 mosques which is much more than the Muslim world.

  

Fact 9

The name ‘India’ is derived from the river Indus. It is a valley around which people settled in earlier times. India is the world’s oldest, largest and continuous civilization – the Indus Valley civilization.

   

Fact 10

10. 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.

Fact 11

 India leads the world with the largest number of films. Over 4700 daily newspapers in more than 300 languages are produced in India.

    

Fact 12

The largest wholesale spice market of Asia is in India – Khari Baoli, New Delhi. India’s road network is the world’s second largest with 4,865,000 km of roads constructed. (2014)

     

Fact 13

The largest number of vegetarians in the world.

   

Fact 14

Be it because of religious reasons or personal choices or both, around 20-40% of Indians are vegetarians, making it the largest vegetarian-friendly country in the world.

Fact 15

Shakuntala Devi was given this title after she demonstrated the calculation of two 13 digit numbers: 7,686,369,774,870 × 2,465,099,745,779 which were picked at random. She answered correctly within 28 seconds.

    

Fact 16

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.

Fact 17

 The decimal system and place value system were developed in India around 100 B.C.

   

Fact 18

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.

   

Fact 19

90 countries from all over the world buy software from India.

     

Fact 20

Takshila, the first ever university in the world started around 700 BC in India.India is the place of origin of Buddhism and Jainism.

     

Fact 21

In the August of 1982, ‘the highest bridge in the world’ – the Baily Bridge, was built by Indian Army.

Fact 22

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.

    

Fact 23

India’s space program is among the top five space programs in the world despite having budget constraints.