India as one of the countries playing an important role in the development of the world’s culture and economy.
Why is India considered to be an important part in the development of the world’s culture and economy? How does India’s location and climate influence its economical potential? How is India’s social structure different from the ordinary social structure?
The Republic of India is also rather interesting in terms of its geography, government structure, political parties and social stratification.
Table of contents:
3. Political culture
4. Society and political parties
6. Current issues
Introduction. India is one of the countries that play a rather important part in the development of the world’s culture and economy in some spheres. India is also one of the most beautiful countries of the planet. Its culture and traditions can fairly be called the richest and the most authentic. Unfortunately, concerning the economical impact India makes into the world’s economy it must be mentioned that India is not very developed and it regarded as a developing and not a developed country. Nevertheless, the “developing” title did not influence the cultural peculiarities of India. India is not similar to any Asian country not mentioning the European countries because it is very individual. This is primarily due to the fact that India consists of 28 states and each state has its own state language, religion and ethnic pattern . India is basically a constellation of religions, as it is the place where almost every world’s religion is represented. The Republic of India is also rather interesting in terms of its geography, government structure, political parties and social stratification.
The Republic of India is situated in South Asia. It is known as the seventh largest country in the world. The Indian subcontinent is predominantly occupied by India itself. The Indian subcontinent in its turn is situated on the Indian Plate. The Deccan plateau makes up a large part of the southern Indian Peninsula. Some of India’s states are in the Himalayan Mountain Range and the majority posses a sufficiently fertile soul for agriculture as are situated in the Indo-Gangetic plain. The waters of the Indian Ocean wash the Republic of India. In addition to the part of India situated on the peninsula, it has islands - Sri Lanka, Maldives and Indonesia. Basically, the country also has three archipelagos. The first is Sunderbans, situated in the Gangetic delta in the West Bengal, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the southeast and Lakshadweep in the southwest coast. India borders with several countries and a desert on its west. This desert is known as a Thar Desert in the southeast of Pakistan. India also borders with Afghanistan, China, Nepal, Bhutan in the north-east, Bangladesh and Myanmar in the east (1). The territory on which India borders with China is the longest as it goes along the Himalayan Mountain Range. The maximum length of the mainland part of the country is 3200 kilometers from the north to the south and 2700 kilometers from west to east. India’s coastline is around 7000 kilometers. There are several main rivers on the territory of the Indian Republic, such as – Krishna, Narmada, Kaveri, Godavari, Yamuna, Brahmaputra and Ganga.
The climate in India varies depending on the part of the country. It is tropical in the south and temperate in the north, due to the Himalayan Mountains. Another factor, which does have a strong, influence over India’s climate besides the Himalayas is the Thar Desert of Pakistan. The true reason the Himalayas are so important for India’s climate is because along with the Hindu Kush mountains they convert into a barrier that prevent the cold Central Asian winds from passing to the territory of the Republic of India. For the same reason India is a “warm” country. Basically India’s location on the continent is favorable for agriculture and for attracting guests in spite of the hot temperature of the country.
3. Political culture
One of the most important aspects required for understanding the contemporary life of the Republic of India is the history of the country. The first human life on the territory of India was found over 9000 years ago. Since then India has always lived out a unique way of life that was not influenced by outside factors. Nothing changed till the invasions of the tenth and the twelfth century conducted by different parts of Central Asia. It was these invasions that made the territory of the future Republic of India stretch greatly over the Indian subcontinent. India’s life in the sixteenth century was marked with the beginning of the trade with United Kingdom, France, Portugal and Netherlands and the appearance of the first colonies that brought European tendencies to India. As the matter of fact the second half of the nineteenth century the majority of the country was under the control of the British Empire(1). These events made the nation strive for independence and strongly fight for it. The First War of Indian Independence did not succeed, but the beginning of the twentieth century was the start of the greatest struggle for independence India has ever known with Mahatma Gandhi as a head. On August 15th, 1947 India became independent from the British Crown and by the 1950 it became the Republic of India with its own newly applied constitution. Nowadays India tries to keep its democracy on the highest level of development.
It is common knowledge that India is the country with the second biggest population in the world. Its population is estimated as one billion people in 2006 (1). This huge population is rather diverse but there are three main things that united the whole nations. They are: language, religion and of course the caste. The language is highly respected by the citizens of the Republic of India and its traditions are kept with strict discipline. The native languages of India are Sanskrit and Tamil. The languages of the population of India are mainly within the Indo-Aryan language family and the Dravidian language family. There are also a great number of dialects, depending on the state, or a part of a state in India. The first one is the most spoken on the territory of the Republic of India and is represented by 74% of the population. Nevertheless, many other languages are also freely spoken in the country, as the constitution mentions twenty-three languages recognized as official ones (3.63). The government of India uses two languages to construct official documents – Hindi and English. Religion means a lot for the population of India. India has the representatives of many religions: the Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Buddhists, Jains, Jews, Zoroastrians, Ahmadis and representatives of other religions (2.33). Over eighty percent of the population is Hindu, but nevertheless the left twenty percent is 20 million people with diverse religions views. Religion is the integral part of the society of the Republic of India. Belonging to a definite religion in India implies absolute belief into spiritual doctrines and following the rules. It also is vital to understand the importance of the caste for the social and political life of the country, both social stratification and political orientation is chosen according to the caste.
The society of India highly values education and it is obtained according to the socio-economic status of the family. The problem of the Republic of India is the gap between highly educated people with European and American education and people who are not educated at all. The level of education for a person sometimes is still determined on the bases of the sex of the child, therefore many women in India are not educated. The rate of literacy of the country is 64,4%, which is made by 75,6% of males and 54,2% of females. Among the most educated states of India, Kerala occupies the first place with its 94% of literacy rate.
India is recognized as the second fastest growing economy. In spite of this positive tendency India, being a developing country has an extremely uneven wealth distribution system, where ten percent of the population gains thirty three percent of the whole income of the country. The per capita income (PPP) of the Republic of India is 3,400 United States dollars. It is believed to be the one hundred twenty-second in the world. The GDP is 3,63 trillion of United States dollars. It also occupies the fourth position as to the purchasing power parity of the country. The republic also has a growing economy which is proved by the GDP rate of growth of 9,1% according to the first quarter of the year 2006.
The external trading process is of a vital importance for the country. The country exports fabrics, clothes, jewelry, and precious stones, agricultural and provision products, cars, medicaments, software, technological services and other products. India produces 33% of the world’s amount of tea. India considers the United States of America, The United Kingdom, China, The United Arab Emirates, Belgium, Hong, Kong and Switzerland to be major exporting-trading partners.
496,4 million people make up the labor force of the Republic of India(5.35). The distribution of this, labor force is different and consists of the next sectors:
1. Agriculture -has 60% of the India’s labor force;
2. Mainstream industry - has 17% of the India’s labor force;
3. Service industries - has 23% of the India’s labor force.
Agriculture is the dominant labor supplier as the country produces potatoes, sugarcane, tea, jute, cotton, oilseed, wheat, and rice. The industry is oriented on machinery, petroleum, mining, cement, transportation equipment, steel, food processing, chemicals and the textile industry (6.22).
As for the government it has an immense control over the private sector due to the debates around the privatization process, the foreign trade and over foreign direct investment.
4. Society and political parties
The society is oriented on democracy and that is the reason the country offers a wide range of political parties with different goals and ways of their realization. Basically, India has a multi-party political system, which is realized through a large amount of regional parties. Regional parties are often very small; nevertheless there is a list of national parties of the Republic. A party is considered to be a national one in case it is elected by at least four states. As India consists of 28 states it is possible to image the possible amount of political parties in India (4.76). After the elections are held out the election results are reviewed and the Election Commission of India gives the party either the status of the national or a regional party. The party cannot be considered official unless it is approved by the decision of the Election Commission. The status of a national party gives certain privileges to the party such as: choosing the party symbol and other identities. In other words there is two kinds of political parties in India: national parties and regional (state) parties. The more influential the party is the more opportunities it has to become a national one. It is possible to identify six of the most influential national parties approved by the Election Commission of the Republic of India: the Communist Party of India, Bahujan Samaj Party, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Bharatiya Janata Party, the Indian National Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party.
As it has been mentioned before the Republic of India has a democratic orientation. It is considered to be the second largest democracy in the world for the reason of having the second largest population and therefore electing population in the world. The Republic of India has a bicameral parliament consisting of Rajya Sabha (Council of States) and Lok Sabha (House of People) and a federal form of government. Rajya Sabha has 245 members being the upper house and Lok Sabha has 545 being the lower house of Parliament. The head of the country is the President, but his power is limited by the Parliament, as he has no real executive power. The President is elected every five years and this process is indirect as the Electoral College approves the candidate. The President gets the command over India’s Armed Forces. The country has three main branches that conduct the control over the whole process of government functioning: the legislative, executive and judiciary powers. As the role of the President is more of a nominal character the Prime Minister is the real head of the government of the Republic of India.
As one of India’s greatest concerns has always been the maintenance of its unity, several issues has severely influenced the country. This primarily deals with the territorial disputes that India with China, Kargil and especially Pakistan. In addition to that the India’s nuclear tests are still fresh in memory, making the conflict even more severe. India and Pakistan cannot truly find a common language as the territory Pakistan claims is there is an area of high economical interest for India. This is the reason the governments of India and Pakistan constantly try to achieve a consensus in order to keep peace in the countries. India is not holding an aggressive position, but nevertheless being a member of the United Nations makes it a strong opponent in terms of the world’s economy.
Conclusion. India, owing to the proper functioning of the government, correct politics and ethnical peculiarities make one of the most interesting nations all over the world. With is highly growing economical rates and its huge population India converts into on the potentially strongest countries, especially in terms of Armed Forces. India is a big country and fits a lot of diverse things: religions, political parties, languages, castes and others. This makes India a country of contrasts where you can find either an educated wealth man or a person that cannot even read and is starving. The Republic of India keeps revealing all its economic, political and cultural potential, which lead the country to the group of the most influential countries on the planet.India’s economic-geographic position gives it certain advantages the country is successfully using and getting profit from it. The country is perfecting the trading and economic skills; therefore it will continue to be converting from a developing to a developed country.