Culture Briefing: India - Your Guide to Indian Culture and Customs

By Bob Martin

Culture Briefing: India, updated May 3, 2020, provides current, in-depth information found in no other single publication to help you understand the culture, customs, values and beliefs of the Indian people. Whether traveling to India, working on a class paper or doing business with the Indians, you'll find Culture Briefing: India an invaluable resource. If you're traveling to the country, supplement your travel guide with Culture Briefing: India. It will let you enrich your trip, giving you knowledge about Indian etiquette and traditions — and more financial success when traveling on business. You'll also receive the information you need to help you feel comfortable in what might otherwise be a strange environment, including a list of do's and don'ts. You'll gain the wisdom necessary to talk intelligently with the Indian people, discussing the life they live, deciphering and interpreting how they think and behave. No longer will you run the risk of embarrassment when in conversation with the Indian people because you brought up a taboo subject, couldn’t comment on an aspect of local life or knew nothing of their form of government. With Culture Briefing: India you'll discover the character, values, beliefs and customs of the Indians. You'll learn of their artistic endeavors and political ways. You'll find out about their home, family and religious life as well as how they make a living, educate their children and spend their leisure time. You'll also discover the problems the Indian people face and see how they handle them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bob Martin
• Release date: May 7, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301528257

Bob Martin

Bob Martin, creator of the Culture Briefing series, has lived in Asia, Africa and Europe. He has also written and edited college textbooks and training lessons for the travel industry, newsletters for travel consumers and travel articles for newspapers and magazines, including: Accent magazine, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Buffalo News, The Christian Science Monitor, The Miami Herald, Milwaukee Journal, Off Duty magazine, The Orlando Sentinel and Travel-Holiday magazine. Currently he writes articles and e-books in the areas of travel, exploration and adventure.

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Culture Briefing: India

Your Guide to Indian Culture and Customs

By Bob Martin

Published by the Geotravel Research Center at Smashwords

Copyright 2013-2020 Bob Martin

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This edition is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Environment

Geography

Fast Facts

HISTORY

THE INDIAN PEOPLE

Customs and Ways

Do’s and Don’ts

Conducting Business

Subcultures

Class Distinctions

Language

HOME AND FAMILY

Marriage

The Role of Women

Funerals

Names

Health and Welfare

Dress

Food and Dining

EDUCATING THE CHILDREN

RELIGIOUS PRACTICES

Hinduism

Islam

Buddhism

Sikhism

Jainism

Zoroastrianism

MAKING A LIVING

Agriculture

PASSING LEISURE TIME

Festivals

Sports

THE ARTS

POLITICAL WAYS

Local Administration

Parties

USEFUL INTERNET LINKS

India News Sources

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

INTRODUCTION

India is a vast, complex and ethnically diverse nation filled with contradictions, which make it difficult to understand its culture. It is the world’s largest democracy and has the world’s second-largest population, behind China. Although India occupies only 2.4 percent of the world’s land area, it supports more than 16 percent of the world’s population.

Throughout much of its history, the country has been invaded, from the Iranian plateau, Central Asia, Arabia, Afghanistan and the West. As a result, India’s people and their culture have absorbed and changed with these varied influences.

Following a period of British rule and several decades during which its economy was virtually closed, India has become a major power, implementing economic reforms in the late 1980s. India also began a series of nuclear tests and has now become a nuclear weapons state.

It is, however, burdened with huge social, economic and environmental problems. It has poor infrastructure, weak government, harsh inequality, corruption and crime. Communal, caste and regional tensions haunt the nation’s politics, sometimes threatening its long-standing democratic and secular ways.

There is an enormous gulf between rich and poor. While the country has a well-off elite numbering a few million people, hundreds of millions are less fortunate. The great majority of rural Indians are illiterate and impoverished. A caste system makes it practically impossible for these people to aspire to upward mobility.

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Environment

The country has severe environmental problems, including deforestation, soil erosion, overgrazing and desertification. Industrial effluents pollute the air, and raw sewage and agricultural pesticides foul the water. Tap water is not drinkable throughout the country.

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Geography

In size, India is