India is a country in South Asia. Comprising the bulk of the Indian subcontinent, India owes its geography, climate and biodiversity to ancient plate tectonics which pushed the Indian Plate north from deep in the Southern Hemisphere. Modern humans arrived on the subcontinent from Africa no later than 55,000 years ago. Settled life emerged in the western margins of the Indus River basin 9,000 years ago. India is home to a large mix of languages, religions, and cultures. It is the world's most populous democracy, with 1.3 billion people, and a secular federal republic governed in a parliamentary system. It is the world's third- largest economy in purchasing power parity, and a fast-growing major economy. After 190 years in the British Empire, India gained independence in 1947 through a campaign of nonviolent resistance whose enduring symbol is Mahatma Gandhi (born 2 October 1869).
Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1937:
President Rafael Trujillo announced that Dominican troops had begun mass killings of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsley_massacre
1942:
Second World War: HMS Curacoa was accidentally rammed and sunk by RMS Queen Mary while escorting the liner to provide protection from submarine attacks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Curacoa_%28D41%29
1996:
A maintenance worker's failure to remove tape covering the static ports of the aircraft caused Aeroperú Flight 603 to crash into the ocean near Lima, Peru, killing all 70 people on board. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroper%C3%BA_Flight_603
2005:
The first parkrun, then known as the Bushy Park Time Trial, took place in Bushy Park, London. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkrun
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
pleach: (transitive) To unite by interweaving, as (horticulture) branches of shrubs, trees, etc., to create a hedge; to interlock, to plash. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pleach
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
The truth seems to be that we live in concepts of the imagination before the reason has established them. If this is true, then reason is simply the methodizer of the imagination. --Wallace Stevens https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Wallace_Stevens