''Hindūstān'' ( , from ''
Hindū'' and
''-stān''), also sometimes spelt as Hindōstān ( ''Indo-land''), along with its shortened form ''Hind'' (),
is the
Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
-language name for the
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
that later became commonly used by its inhabitants in the
Hindi–Urdu
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the ''lingua franca'' of Northern and Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two standard registers, known as Hindi and Urdu. Thus, the langu ...
language.
[
Hindustan was the ]Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
word for ''India'', but when introduced to the subjects under Persianate
A Persianate society is a society that is based on or strongly influenced by the Persian language, culture, literature, art and/or identity.
The term "Persianate" is a neologism credited to Marshall Hodgson. In his 1974 book, ''The Venture of Is ...
rule, the subsequent culture
Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.Tyl ...
which resulted from these events gave it another specific meaning that of the cultural region
In anthropology and geography, a cultural region, cultural sphere, cultural area or culture area refers to a geography with one relatively homogeneous human activity or complex of activities (culture). Such activities are often associated ...
between the river Sutlej
The Sutlej or Satluj River () is the longest of the five rivers that flow through the historic crossroads region of Punjab in northern India and Pakistan. The Sutlej River is also known as ''Satadru''. It is the easternmost tributary of the Ind ...
(end of Northwestern India) and the city Varanasi
Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world.
*
*
*
* The city has a syncretic t ...
(start of Eastern India). As the area where Ganga-Jamuni Tehzeeb
''Ganga–Jamuni Tehzeeb'' ( Hindustani for ''Ganges–Yamuna Culture''), also spelled as ''Ganga-Jamni Tehzeeb'' or just Hindustani Tehzeeb, is the high culture that arose in the Yamuna-Gangetic plains of northern India, the Hindustan region ...
and the Hindustani language
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the '' lingua franca'' of Northern and Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two standard registers, known as Hindi and Urdu. Thus, the lan ...
traces its origins, it corresponds to the plains where the river Yamuna
The Yamuna (Hindustani language, Hindustani: ), also spelt Jumna, is the second-largest tributary river of the Ganges by discharge and the longest tributary in List of major rivers of India, India. Originating from the Yamunotri Glacier at a ...
flows or the regions/states encompassing Haryana
Haryana (; ) is an Indian state located in the northern part of the country. It was carved out of the former state of East Punjab on 1 Nov 1966 on a linguistic basis. It is ranked 21st in terms of area, with less than 1.4% () of India's land ar ...
, Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...
, Harit Pradesh
Harit Pradesh is a proposed new state of India comprising the western parts of Uttar Pradesh state. The etymology derives from Harit, meaning Green (which signifies the agricultural prosperity of the region), and Pradesh, meaning state.
The r ...
, and Awadh
Awadh (), known in British historical texts as Avadh or Oudh, is a region in the modern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, which was before independence known as the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. It is synonymous with the Kośāla region of ...
.
Other toponyms for the subcontinent include ''Jambudvīpa
Jambudvīpa ( sa, जम्बुद्वीप; Pali: Jambudīpa) is a name often used to describe the territory of Greater India in Ancient Indian sources.
The term is based on the concept of '' dvīpa'', meaning "island" or "continent" i ...
'' and ''Bharata Khanda
Bharata Khanda (IAST : ''Bhāratakhaṇḍa'') is a term used in Hindu texts, including the Vedas, ''Mahabharata'', ''Ramayana'' and the Puranic, to describe the Indian subcontinent. The historical context of the Sanskrit epics are the Vedi ...
''. Since the Partition of India
The Partition of British India in 1947 was the Partition (politics), change of political borders and the division of other assets that accompanied the dissolution of the British Raj in South Asia and the creation of two independent dominions: ...
in 1947, although limitedly, ''Hindustan'' continues to be used to the present day as a historic name for the Republic of India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
.
Etymology
Hindustan is derived from the Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
word ''Hindū'' cognate with the Sanskrit ''Sindhu''.
The Proto-Iranian
Proto-Iranian or Proto-Iranic is the reconstructed proto-language of the Iranian languages branch of Indo-European language family and thus the ancestor of the Iranian languages such as Pashto, Persian, Sogdian, Zazaki, Ossetian, Mazandarani ...
sound change ''*s'' > ''h'' occurred between 850 and 600 BCE, according to Asko Parpola
Asko Parpola (born 12 July 1941, in Forssa) is a Finnish Indologist, current professor emeritus of South Asian studies at the University of Helsinki. He specializes in Sindhology, specifically the study of the Indus script.
Biography
Parpola is ...
. Hence, the Rigvedic
The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' ( ', from ' "praise" and ' "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (''śruti'') known as the Vedas. Only one S ...
''sapta sindhava'' (the land of seven rivers) became ''hapta hindu'' in the Avesta
The Avesta () is the primary collection of religious texts of Zoroastrianism, composed in the Avestan language.
The Avesta texts fall into several different categories, arranged either by dialect, or by usage. The principal text in the litu ...
. It was said to be the "fifteenth domain" created by Ahura Mazda
Ahura Mazda (; ae, , translit=Ahura Mazdā; ), also known as Oromasdes, Ohrmazd, Ahuramazda, Hoormazd, Hormazd, Hormaz and Hurmuz, is the creator deity in Zoroastrianism. He is the first and most frequently invoked spirit in the ''Yasna''. ...
, apparently a land of 'abnormal heat'.
In 515 BCE, Darius I
Darius I ( peo, 𐎭𐎠𐎼𐎹𐎺𐎢𐏁 ; grc-gre, Δαρεῖος ; – 486 BCE), commonly known as Darius the Great, was a Persian ruler who served as the third King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 522 BCE until his ...
annexed the Indus Valley
The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir, ...
including ''Sindhu'', the present day Sindh
Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...
, which was called ''Hindu'' in Persian. During the time of Xerxes, the term "Hindu" was also applied to the lands to the east of Indus.
In middle Persian
Middle Persian or Pahlavi, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg () in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire. For some time after the Sasanian collapse, Middle Per ...
, probably from the first century CE, the suffix ''-stān
The suffix -stan ( fa, ـستان, translit=''stân'' after a vowel; ''estân'' or ''istân'' after a consonant), has the meaning of "a place abounding in" or "a place where anything abounds" in the Persian language. It appears in the names of ...
'' was added, indicative of a country or region, forming the present word ''Hindūstān''. Thus, Sindh was referred to as ''Hindūstān'' in the Naqsh-e-Rustam inscription of Shapur I
Shapur I (also spelled Shabuhr I; pal, 𐭱𐭧𐭯𐭥𐭧𐭥𐭩, Šābuhr ) was the second Sasanian King of Kings of Iran. The dating of his reign is disputed, but it is generally agreed that he ruled from 240 to 270, with his father Ardas ...
in 262 CE.
Historian B. N. Mukherjee
Bratindra Nath Mukherjee (1 January 1932 – 4 April 2013) was an Indian historian, numismatist, epigraphist and iconographist, known for his scholarship in central Asian languages such as Sogdian. He was a Carmichael Professor of Ancient Indi ...
states that from the lower Indus basin, the term ''Hindūstān'' got gradually extended to "more or less the whole of the subcontinent
A continent is any of several large landmasses. Generally identified by convention rather than any strict criteria, up to seven geographical regions are commonly regarded as continents. Ordered from largest in area to smallest, these seven ...
". The Greco-Roman name "India" and the Chinese name ''Shen-tu'' also followed a similar evolution.
The Arabic term ''Hind'', derived from Persian ''Hindu'', was previously used by the Arabs to refer to the much wider Indianised region from the Makran
Makran ( fa, مكران), mentioned in some sources as Mecran and Mokrān, is the coastal region of Baluchistan. It is a semi-desert coastal strip in Balochistan, in Pakistan and Iran, along the coast of the Gulf of Oman. It extends westwards, ...
coast to the Indonesian archipelago. But eventually it too became identified with the Indian subcontinent.
Current usage
Republic of India
"Hindustan" is often used to refer to the modern-day Republic of India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
. Slogans involving the term are commonly heard at sports events and other public programmes involving teams or entities representing the modern nation-state of India. In marketing, it is also commonly used as an indicator of national origin in advertising campaigns and is present in many company names. Muhammad Ali Jinnah
Muhammad Ali Jinnah (, ; born Mahomedali Jinnahbhai; 25 December 1876 – 11 September 1948) was a barrister, politician, and the founder of Pakistan. Jinnah served as the leader of the All-India Muslim League from 1913 until the ...
, the founder of Pakistan
Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
, and his party the Muslim League Muslim League may refer to:
Political parties Subcontinent
; British India
*All-India Muslim League, Mohammed Ali Jinah, led the demand for the partition of India resulting in the creation of Pakistan.
**Punjab Muslim League, a branch of the organ ...
, insisted on calling the modern-day Republic of India "Hindustan" in reference to its Hindu-majority population.
People
The term 'Hindustani' refers to an Indian, irrespective of religious affiliation. Among non-Hindustani speakers e.g. Bengali-speakers, "Hindustani" is used to describe persons who are from the Yamuna-Ganges belt; also regardless of religious affiliation, but rather as a geographic term.
''Hindustani'' is sometimes used as an ethnic
An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...
term applied to South Asia (''e.g.'', a Mauritian or Surinamese man with roots in South Asia might describe his ethnicity by saying he is ''Hindustani''). For example, '' Hindoestanen'' is a Dutch
Dutch commonly refers to:
* Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands
* Dutch people ()
* Dutch language ()
Dutch may also refer to:
Places
* Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States
* Pennsylvania Dutch Country
People E ...
word used to describe people of South Asian
South Asia is the southern Subregion#Asia, subregion of Asia, which is defined in both geography, geographical and culture, ethno-cultural terms. The region consists of the countries of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, ...
origin, in the Netherlands
)
, anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, subdivision_type = Sovereign state
, subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands
, established_title = Before independence
, established_date = Spanish Netherl ...
and Suriname
Suriname (; srn, Sranankondre or ), officially the Republic of Suriname ( nl, Republiek Suriname , srn, Ripolik fu Sranan), is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north ...
.
Language
The ''Hindustani language
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the '' lingua franca'' of Northern and Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two standard registers, known as Hindi and Urdu. Thus, the lan ...
'' is the language of Hindustan and the lingua franca
A lingua franca (; ; for plurals see ), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, vehicular language, or link language, is a language systematically used to make communication possible between groups ...
of the northern Indian subcontinent. Hindustani derives from the Old Hindi
Old Hindi was the earliest stage of the Delhi dialect (Khariboli) of the Hindustani language, and so the ancestor of Modern Hindi and Modern Urdu. It developed from Shauraseni Prakrit and was spoken by the peoples of the Hindi Belt, especially aro ...
dialect of Western Uttar Pradesh
Western Uttar Pradesh is a region in India that comprises the western districts of Uttar Pradesh state, including the areas of Rohilkhand and those where Khariboli, Braj and Kannauji are spoken. The region has some demographic, economic and cul ...
and Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...
areas. Its literary standard forms—Modern Standard Hindi
Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been des ...
and —use different scripts. The Hindi register itself derives its name from shortened form, ''Hind'' (India).
Historical usages
Early Persian scholars had limited knowledge of the extent of India. After the advent of Islam and the Muslim conquests
The early Muslim conquests or early Islamic conquests ( ar, الْفُتُوحَاتُ الإسْلَامِيَّة, ), also referred to as the Arab conquests, were initiated in the 7th century by Muhammad, the main Islamic prophet. He estab ...
, the meaning of ''Hindustan'' interacted with its Arabic variant ''Hind'', which was derived from Persian as well, and almost became synonymous with it. The Arabs, engaging in oceanic trade, included all the lands from ''Tis'' in western Balochistan (near modern Chabahar
Chābahār ( fa, چابهار, bal, چھبار, čahbàr; ; formerly ''Bandar Beheshtī'') is the capital city of Chabahar County, Sistan and Baluchestan Province, Iran. It is a free port (free-trade zone) situated on the coast of the Gulf of ...
) to the Indonesian archipelago, in their idea of ''Hind'', especially when used in its expansive form as "''Al-Hind''". ''Hindustan'' did not acquire this elaborate meaning. According to André Wink, it also did not acquire the distinction, which faded away, between ''Sind'' (roughly what is now western Pakistan) and ''Hind'' (the lands to the east of the Indus River);[: "The Arabs, like the Greeks, adopted a pre-existing Persian term, but they were the first to extend its application to the entire Indianized region from Sind and Makran to the Indonesian Archipelago and mainland Southeast Asia."] other sources state that ''Sind'' and ''Hind'' were used synonymously from early times, and that after the arrival of Islamic rule in India, "the variants Hind and Sind were used, as synonyms, for the entire subcontinent." The 10th century text '' Hudud al-Alam'' defined ''Hindustan'' as roughly the Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
, with its western limit formed by the river Indus, southern limit going up to the Great Sea and the eastern limit at Kamarupa
Kamarupa (; also called Pragjyotisha or Pragjyotisha-Kamarupa), an early state during the Classical period on the Indian subcontinent, was (along with Davaka) the first historical kingdom of Assam.
Though Kamarupa prevailed from 350 to 11 ...
, the present day Assam. For the next ten centuries, both ''Hind'' and ''Hindustan'' were used within the subcontinent with exactly this meaning, along with their adjectives ''Hindawi'', ''Hindustani'' and ''Hindi''. Indeed, in 1220 CE, historian Hasan Nizami
Hasan Nizami was a Persian language poet and historian, who lived in the 12th and 13th centuries. He migrated from Nishapur to Delhi in India, where he wrote ''Tajul-Ma'asir'', the first official history of the Delhi Sultanate.
Early life
Lit ...
described ''Hind'' as being "from Peshawar
Peshawar (; ps, پېښور ; hnd, ; ; ur, ) is the sixth most populous city in Pakistan, with a population of over 2.3 million. It is situated in the north-west of the country, close to the International border with Afghanistan. It is ...
to the shores of the Ocean">ndianOcean, and in the other direction from Siwistan to the hills of Chin."
North India
With the Turko-Persian conquests starting in the 11th century, a narrower meaning of ''Hindustan'' also took shape. The conquerors were liable to call the lands under their control ''Hindustan'', ignoring the rest of the subcontinent.[Shoaib Daniyal]
Land of Hindus? Mohan Bhagwat, Narendra Modi and the Sangh Parivar are using 'Hindustan' all wrong
Scroll.in, 30 October 2017.
In the early 11th century a satellite state
A satellite state or dependent state is a country that is formally independent in the world, but under heavy political, economic, and military influence or control from another country. The term was coined by analogy to planetary objects orbiting ...
of the Ghaznavid
The Ghaznavid dynasty ( fa, غزنویان ''Ġaznaviyān'') was a culturally Persianate, Sunni Muslim dynasty of Turkic ''mamluk'' origin, ruling, at its greatest extent, large parts of Persia, Khorasan, much of Transoxiana and the northwest ...
s in the Punjab
Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...
with its capital at Lahore
Lahore ( ; pnb, ; ur, ) is the second most populous city in Pakistan after Karachi and 26th most populous city in the world, with a population of over 13 million. It is the capital of the province of Punjab where it is the largest city. ...
was called "Hindustan". After the Delhi Sultanate
The Delhi Sultanate was an Islamic empire based in Delhi that stretched over large parts of the Indian subcontinent for 320 years (1206–1526). was established, north India, especially the Gangetic plains and the Punjab, came to be called "Hindustan".[: "Hindostan, n.p. Pers. ''Hindūstan''. (a) 'The country of Hindūs', India. In modern native parlance the word indicates distinctively (b) India north of the Nerbudda, and exclusive of Bengal and Behar. The latter provinces are regarded as ''pūrb'' (see Poorub), and all south of the Nerbudda as ''Dakhan'' (see Deccan). But the word is used in older Mahommedan authors just as it is used in English school-books and atlases, viz., as (a) the equivalent of India Proper. Thus Babur says of Hindustan: 'On the East, the South and the West it is bounded by the Ocean'"] Scholar Bratindra Nath Mukherjee states that this narrow meaning of ''Hindustan'' existed side by side with the wider meaning, and some of the authors used both of them simultaneously.
The Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the d ...
(1526–1857) called the invaded Bharatiya land as 'Hindustan'. The term 'Mughal' itself was never used to refer to the land. As the empire expanded, so too did the expanded usage of the word 'Hindustan'. At the same time, the meaning of 'Hindustan' as the entire Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
is also found in ''Baburnama
The ''Bāburnāma'' ( chg, ; literally: ''"History of Babur"'' or ''"Letters of Babur"''; alternatively known as ''Tuzk-e Babri'') is the memoirs of Ẓahīr-ud-Dīn Muhammad Bābur (1483–1530), founder of the Mughal Empire and a great-great- ...
'' and ''Ain-i-Akbari
The ''Ain-i-Akbari'' ( fa, ) or the "Administration of Akbar", is a 16th-century detailed document recording the administration of the Mughal Empire under Emperor Akbar, written by his court historian, Abu'l Fazl in the Persian language. It for ...
''.
Kingdom of Nepal usage
The last Gorkhali
The Gurkhas or Gorkhas (), with endonym Gorkhali ), are soldiers native to the Indian Subcontinent, chiefly residing within Nepal and some parts of Northeast India.
The Gurkha units are composed of Nepalis and Indian Gorkhas and are recruit ...
King Prithvi Narayan Shah
Maharajadhiraj Prithvi Narayan Shah (1723–1775) ( ne, श्री ५ बडामहाराजाधिराज पृथ्वीनारायण शाह देव) was the last ruler of the Gorkha Kingdom and first monarch of the ...
self proclaimed the newly unified Kingdom of Nepal
The Kingdom of Nepal ( ne, नेपाल अधिराज्य), also known as the Gorkha Empire ( ne, गोरखा अधिराज्य) or Asal Hindustan ( ne, असल हिन्दुस्तान)(), was a Hindu king ...
as ''Asal Hindustan'' (Real Hindustan) due to North India being ruled by the Islamic
Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God (or '' Allah'') as it was revealed to Muhammad, the mai ...
Mughal rulers. The self proclamation was done to enforce Hindu social code Dharmashastra over his reign and refer to his country as being inhabitable for Hindus
Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
. He also referred Northern India as ''Mughlan'' (Country of Mughals
The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the d ...
) and called the region infiltrated by Muslim foreigners.
Colonial Indian usage
These dual meanings persisted with the arrival of Europeans. Rennel produced an atlas titled the ''Memoir of a Map of Hindoostan or the Mogul Empire'' in 1792, which was in fact a map of the Indian subcontinent. Rennel thus conflated the three notions, 'India', 'Hindustan' and the Mughal Empire. J. Bernoulli, to whom ''Hindustan'' meant the Mughal Empire, called his French translation ''La Carte générale de l'Inde'' (General Map of India).
This 'Hindustan' of British reckoning was divided into British-ruled territories (sometimes referred to as 'India') and the territories ruled by native rulers. The British officials and writers, however, thought that the Indians used 'Hindustan' to refer to only North India.[ An ''Anglo-Indian Dictionary'' published in 1886 states that, while ''Hindustan'' means India, in the "nativa parlance" it had come to represent the region north of Narmada River excluding ]Bihar
Bihar (; ) is a state in eastern India. It is the 2nd largest state by population in 2019, 12th largest by area of , and 14th largest by GDP in 2021. Bihar borders Uttar Pradesh to its west, Nepal to the north, the northern part of West Be ...
and Bengal
Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...
.
During the independence movement, the Indians referred to their land by all three names: 'India', 'Hindustan' and 'Bharat'. Mohammad Iqbal
Sir Muhammad Iqbal ( ur, ; 9 November 187721 April 1938), was a South Asian Muslim writer, philosopher, Quote: "In Persian, ... he published six volumes of mainly long poems between 1915 and 1936, ... more or less complete works on philoso ...
's poem '' Tarānah-e-Hindī'' ("Anthem of the People of Hind") was a popular patriotic song among Indian independence activists.
''Sāre jahāṉ se acchā Hindustān hamārā''
(the best of all lands is our Hindustan)
Partition of India
The 1940 Lahore Resolution
The Lahore Resolution ( ur, , ''Qarardad-e-Lahore''; Bengali: লাহোর প্রস্তাব, ''Lahor Prostab''), also called Pakistan resolution, was written and prepared by Muhammad Zafarullah Khan and was presented by A. K. Fazlul ...
of the All-India Muslim League
The All-India Muslim League (AIML) was a political party established in Dhaka in 1906 when a group of prominent Muslim politicians met the Viceroy of British India, Lord Minto, with the goal of securing Muslim interests on the Indian subcontin ...
demanded sovereignty for the Muslim-majority areas in the northwest and northeast of British India
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...
, which came to be called 'Pakistan' in popular parlance and the remaining India came to be called 'Hindustan'. The British officials too picked up the two terms and started using them officially.
However, this naming did not meet the approval of Indian leaders due to the implied meaning of 'Hindustan' as the land of Hindus
Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
. They insisted that the new Dominion of India
The Dominion of India, officially the Union of India,* Quote: “The first collective use (of the word "dominion") occurred at the Colonial Conference (April to May 1907) when the title was conferred upon Canada and Australia. New Zealand and N ...
should be called 'India', not 'Hindustan'. Probably for the same reason, the name 'Hindustan' did not receive official sanction of the Constituent Assembly of India
The Constituent Assembly of India was elected to frame the Constitution of India. It was elected by the 'Provincial Assembly'. Following India's independence from the British rule in 1947, its members served as the nation's first Parliament as ...
, whereas 'Bharat' was adopted as an official name. It was recognised however that 'Hindustan' would continue to be used unofficially.
The Indian Armed Forces
The Indian Armed Forces are the military forces of the Republic of India. It consists of three professional uniformed services: the Indian Army, Indian Navy, and Indian Air Force.—— Additionally, the Indian Armed Forces are supported by ...
use the salutary version of the name, "Jai Hind
Jai Hind (, , ) is a salutation and slogan that originally meant "Victory to Hindustan", and in contemporary colloquial usage often means "Long live India" or "Salute to India". Coined by Champakaraman Pillai and used during India's independenc ...
" as a battle cry.
See also
* Names for India
The Republic of India has two principal short names, each of which is historically significant, "India" and "Bharata". A third name, "Hindustān", is sometimes an alternative name for the region comprising most of the modern Indian states o ...
* Āryāvarta
Āryāvarta (Sanskrit: आर्यावर्त, lit. "abode of the Aryans, Aryas",[Bharata Khanda
Bharata Khanda (IAST : ''Bhāratakhaṇḍa'') is a term used in Hindu texts, including the Vedas, ''Mahabharata'', ''Ramayana'' and the Puranic, to describe the Indian subcontinent. The historical context of the Sanskrit epics are the Vedi ...]
* -stan
The suffix -stan ( fa, ـستان, translit=''stân'' after a vowel; ''estân'' or ''istân'' after a consonant), has the meaning of "a place abounding in" or "a place where anything abounds" in the Persian language. It appears in the names of ...
References
General sources
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Further reading
* ''A Sketch of the History of Hindustan from the First Muslim Conquest to the Fall of the Mughal Empire'' by H. G. Keene.
Hindustan
The English Historical Review, Vol. 2, No. 5 (Jan. 1887), pp. 180–181.)
* ''Story of India through the Ages; An Entertaining History of Hindustan, to the Suppression of the Mutiny'', by Flora Annie Steel, 1909 E.P. Dutton and Co., New York. (as recommended by the New York Times
Book Review, 20 February 1909, New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
.)
* ''The History of Hindustan: Post Classical and Modern'', Ed. B.S. Danniya and Alexander Dow. 2003, Motilal Banarsidass, . (History of Hindustan (First published: 1770–1772). Dow had succeeded his father as the private secretary of Mughal Emperor
The Mughal emperors ( fa, , Pādishāhān) were the supreme heads of state of the Mughal Empire on the Indian subcontinent, mainly corresponding to the modern countries of India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh. The Mughal rulers styled t ...
Aurangzeb
Muhi al-Din Muhammad (; – 3 March 1707), commonly known as ( fa, , lit=Ornament of the Throne) and by his regnal title Alamgir ( fa, , translit=ʿĀlamgīr, lit=Conqueror of the World), was the sixth emperor of the Mughal Empire, ruling ...
.)
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Cultural history of India
Demographic history of India
Persian words and phrases
Urdu-language words and phrases
Bengali words and phrases
Hindi words and phrases
Toponyms for India
North India