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12 Surprising Facts You May Not Know About In India
Surprising Facts: You never can know enough about India, no matter how much you learn. The country’s diversity hides a plethora of incredible but true facts. Here are 12 surprising facts about India that will make you fall in love with it.
1. India introduced shampoo to the world
Among the many fascinating facts about India, this one stands out the most. Locals in India were the first to use shampoo. Hair was cleaned with dried Indian gooseberry blended with a range of other herbs, a recipe that is still used in the nation today. The word’shampoo’ originates from the Hindi word champo, which meaning ‘to clean’.
2. The earliest diamond in the world was mined in India
It is said the first diamond was found and mined in India, among vast alluvial deposits of the stone on the banks of the Krishna and Godavari rivers. India has also generated some of the world’s largest diamonds.
3. The highest cricket ground can be found here
Another interesting fact about India is that the Chail Cricket Venue in Chail, Himachal Pradesh, is the world’s highest cricket ground. It is located at a height of 2,444 metres and is part of the famed Chail Military School, which has been built in the 19th century.
4. India took part in the discovery of water on the moon
This is a fact that Indians take pride in remembering. India was the first to discover that there is water on the moon. The Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission of the Indian Space Research Organisation discovered water using a Moon Mineralogy Mapper.
5. The first ever rocket launched from India
The first Indian rocket was so light and small that it was brought to the Thumba Launching Station in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, on a bicycle.
6. The woman nicknamed ‘the human calculator’ is from India
Shakuntala Devi of Bengaluru, India, made the Guinness Book of World Records in 1982 when she multiplied two thirteen-digit integers in 28 seconds and gave the right solution. ‘The Human Calculator,’ as the amazing mental calculator was called.
7. Freddie Mercury and Sir Ben Kingsley have Indian grandparents
The iconic vocalist Freddie Mercury of the British band Queen was known as Farrokh Bulsara in Parsi. Sir Ben Kingsley is the son of Rahimtulla Harji Bhanji and Anna Lyna Mary, and is a well-known actor. Krishna Pandit Bhanji is his given name.
8. India sets up a voting poll booth for one
During elections, India puts up a single-person voting station in the Gir Forest. Mr. Mahant Bharatdas Darshandas has been voting in a polling booth specifically designed for him since 2004.
9. It was the first country to produce sugar
Since ancient times, India has been producing sugar. The usage of sugarcane and its benefits in medicine and food were first discovered the people on the Indian subcontinent.
10 .It is home to a floating post office
India has the most post offices per capita in the world. The Indian state of Kashmir has a floating post office atop a boat, as if India wasn’t already exclusive enough. The post office is located on the famed and gorgeous Dal Lake, a popular tourist destination in Kashmir, and the floating post office adds to its distinctiveness.
11. It has a village called Snapdeal.com Nagar
After snapdeal.com, the e-commerce company, erected 15 hand-pumps in Shiv Nagar hamlet in Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh, the village was renamed ‘Snapdeal.com Nagar’ so that the locals wouldn’t have to go for kilometres to obtain water. Snapdeal’s logo is plastered all over the village.
12. It is the wettest inhabited place in the world
In 1985, a village called Mawsynram in the state of Meghalaya got 26,000 mm of rain, earning it the title of “wettest place on earth.” This little town, nestled in the beautiful Khasi Hills in northeast India, doesn’t have much to offer visitors other than rain.