Olympiad Test Level 1: A Brief History of India and the World- 2

• Dravidian languages, a family of around 70 languages mainly spoken in South Asia.
• The Dravidian languages are split into groups in the South, South-Middle Central, and North; these groups are further split into 24 subgroups.
• The Constitution of India acknowledges the four major literary languages: Tamil, Telugu,  Malayalam, and Kannada.
• They are also official languages, respectively, of the states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Karnataka (formerly Mysore).
• Tamil is the oldest of the four literary languages in the Dravidian family, with examples dating to the early Common Period.
• Tolkappiyam (1st–4th century CE; "Ancient Literature"), the first known work in the Tamil language, is a treatise on grammar and poetics.

• A granary has been found which the largest building of the Mohenjo-Daro. 
• This granary is divided into 27 rooms of different sizes and shapes. It is a brick structure that was built on a massive brick foundation over 45 meters north-south and 45 meters east-west.
• The "great bath" is the earliest public water tank in the ancient world. The tank itself measures approximately 12 meters north-south and 7 meters wide, with a maximum depth of 2.4 meters.

Raja Todar Mal, as finance minister of Akbar, introduced a new system of revenue known as zabt and a system of taxation called dahshala.

The Lodi dynasty was an Afghan dynasty that ruled the Delhi Sultanate from 1451 to 1526. It was the last dynasty of the Delhi Sultanate and was founded by Bahlul Khan Lodi when he replaced the Sayyid dynasty.

Vedic deities were predominantly Indra, Agni (fire), Soma, Mitra – Varuna, Aryaman, Bhaga & Amsa. They used to worship nature deities such as Surya (Sun), Vayu (Wind) and Prithvi (Earth). Rivers specially Saraswati, were worshipped as the goddess. Yajna was the mode of worship, which was the performance of sacrifices. It included Vedic chants, samans singing and sacrificial mantra i.e. yajus. Yajna involved sacrificing havan samagri in the fire while chanting the Vedic mantra.

Kalinga refers to the coastal region between the Godavari and Mahanadi rivers. Kalinga is the ancient name of coastal Orissa. Ashoka fought a war to overcome Kalinga. The modern name of the Kalinga state conquered by Ashoka is Odisha.

In the medieval period there was a social hierarchy based on the caste system in India. Cash is considered as one of the social stratification. In medieval period the caste system is mainly classified into four types based on the work that people perform. They are,

• Brahmanas who were considered as the people priest the Lord.
• Kshatriyas are the people who were considered as the Warriors.
• Vaishyas are the people who were skilled traders as well as merchants.
• Shudras are considered as the unskilled workers. Mostly they are the untouchables and servants of the other caste people.

Bal Gangadhar Tilak used to run his two newspapers, Kesari, in Marathi and Mahratta (Run by Kesari-Maratha Trust) in English from Kesari Wada, Narayan Peth, Pune.

Swami Dayanand Saraswati was an Indian social leader and the founder of Arya Samaj. He founded Arya Samaj on 10 April 1875. Members of Arya Samaj believe in one God and reject the worship of idols.

Though Portugal's presence in India initially started in 1498, their colonial rule lasted from 1505 until 1961. The Portuguese Empire established the first European trading centre at Quilon (Kollam) in 1502.

Subhash Chandra Bose: Translation of a Hindi speech by Smt Indira Gandhi at a meeting to welcome the relics of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, Delhi, December 17, 1967. Many of us assembled here today knew Netaji well, and on this occasion, we are overwhelmed by the memory of one who gave us the slogan Dilli Chalo.

In the Lahore session of December 1929, Congress passed the Poorna Swaraj or the Complete Independence resolution.

In 1921 the slogan was first coined by Urdu poet and freedom fighter Hasrat Mohani. Inquilab zindabad which literally means long live the revolution inspired many freedom fighters. Bhagat Singh, Batuk Dutta, and Chandra Sekhar Azad were overwhelmed by this slogan and started using it. Later it was used as the slogan for their party Hindustan Socialist Republican Association.

On the historic day of 12th March 1930, Gandhi inaugurated The Civil Disobedience Movement by conducting the historic Dandi Salt March, where he broke the Salt Laws imposed by the British Government. Followed by seventy-eight ashramites, Gandhi embarked on his march from his Sabarmati Ashram to Dandi that is located on the shores of the Arabian Sea. On 6th April 1930, Gandhi with the accompaniment of seventy-eight satyagrahis, violated the Salt Law by picking up a fistful of salt lying on the sea shore. They manually made salt on the shores of Dandi.

The Jallianwala Bagh massacre took place on 13 April 1919 when troops of the British Indian Army under the command of General Dyer fired rifles into a crowd of Baisakhi pilgrims, who had gathered in Jallianwala Bagh, Amritsar, Punjab. The government of India ordered an investigation of the incident (the Hunter Commission), which in 1920 censured Dyer for his actions and ordered him to resign from the military. Reaction in Britain to the massacre was mixed, however.