India

• India is officially known as Republic of India.
• It is the 7th largest country and 2nd most populous country and the largest democracy in the world.
• It is the world's 10 largest economy.
• It was first gradually ruled by the British east India company. From mid 19th century, it was ruled directly by UK.
• It gained independence on 15 august 1947.
• British Raj was separated into India and Pakistan.
• India currently has 28 states and 7 Union Territories.
• Islam came to India in the 10th century.
• India's population is forecasted to overtake china's population to become the most populous country.
• It has 2 major languages, Indo-Aryan and Dravidian.
• India has no national language(not mentioned in the constitution). Hindi and English are the official languages
• Hinduism is followed by 81% of the population.
• Islam is 2nd largest religion both in India and the world.
• India is known for its religious diversity with all religions living unitedly. It is a secular country and anyone can follow any religion.
• The earliest text were epics like Mahabharata and Ramayana written in Sanskrit. Following this, Tamil texts were found dated 1st century BC. Out of Indian languages, Tamil in the most non-sanskritised language. So, if you know both Tamil and Sanskrit, you can understand most of the Indian languages.
• The staple food is Rice(South and East), Wheat(North) and lentils.
• India has 3 national days - Republic day, Independence day and Gandhi Jayanthi declared by the Indian government.
• It also has other religious holidays declared by the state government.
• India was the richest country before European invasion.
• India was the only source of Diamonds for 5000 years. It was discovered in Brazil in 700, but only Indian diamond was known to the rest of the world until 18th century.
• The traditional dress varies with region, but the primary cloth is Saree for women and Dhoti for men.
• Martial arts went to China through Buddhist monks.
• Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism originated in India.
• The national emblem is Ashoka Emblem, which has 4 lions in different directions.

1. National Animal - Tiger
2. National Bird - Peacock
3. National Dance - Bharata Natyam
4. National Flower - Lotus
5. National Fruit - Mango
6. National Tree - Banyan
7. National Song - Vande Mataram
8. National Game - Hockey

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Wikipedia

We search information of all types in Wikipedia, but don't you want to know about the website?

• Wikipedia is a multilingual encyclopedia supported by the non-profit organisation "Wikimedia Foundation"
• It is free, web-based and collaborative.
• it was formally launched on January 15, 2001, with its single English edition.
• The articles are written mainly by volunteers around the world.
• Currently, it has 19.8 million articles. (3.7 million English articles)
• The website has about 90,000 regular contributors.
• Anyone can edit the pages. So, you can never say that all the information is correct. But, you can greatly rely on it.
• It has been ranked 7th globally among other websites.
• As of July 2011, it has editions in 282 languages.
• English Wikipedia passed the 2 million mark in September 2007.
• Wikipedia "makes no guarantee on validity" of its content.
• it is the most widely used encyclopedia.

Google

Who doesnt know google? Everyone know it

• Google was started in 1996.
• It was started as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
• The name was actually meant to be "Googol", the number 1 followed by 100 numbers. But it was misspelled and written as Google.
• It originally ran under the Stanford University website with the domain google.stanford.edu
• The domain was registered in September 1997 and the office was started in 1998.
• It gained instant recognisation and became famous.
• It started to acquire other companies from 2001.
• In 2004, it acquired keyhole inc. and renamed it as Google Earth.
• In 2006, YouTube was acquired for a whooping 1.65 billion
• Orkut was acquired from a google's employee in 2004.
• Google is the best and most widely used search engine in the world.

List Of Famous Google Products

1. Android
2. Chrome
3. Gmail
4. Google Earth
5. Picasa
6. Blogger
7. Orkut
8. Calender
9. News
10. iGoogle
11. YouTube
12. Translate
13. AdSense
14. Google+
15. Sms Channels
16. Google Sites
17. Gadgets
18. Desktop

The Universe

• Universe is defined as the collection of everything that exists.
• It is the only isolated system in the world.
• The word Universe is derived from the french word Unviers, which in turn is taken from the Latin word Universum.
• The age of the earth is estimated to be 13.75 billion years.
• There are probably more than 100 billion galaxies in the universe.
• Our galaxy, the Milky way galaxy is roughly around 100,000 light years in Diameter.
• A light year is defined as the distance covered by light in one year.
• A galaxy may have stars from 10 million to 1 trillion.
• Many cultures and mythologies have stories describing the origin of the universe.
• The matter in the universe in expanding continuously .
• The most accepted theory is the creation of universe is the Big Bang Theory.
• Niclolaus Copernicus was the first person to say that sun is at the center and earth rotates around the sun. Before this, earth was thought to be stationary and sun rotates around the sun.

Steve Jobs

• Steven Jandali was born on February 24, 1955 in San Francisco. His ancestors were of European origin.
• He was adopted by Paul Jobs when he was five years old and became Steven Jobs.
• He studied in California, but dropped out of college.
• At the age of 19, Jobs got a Job as a technician at Atari, a video game manufacturer.
• After saving enough money, he then traveled to India for spiritual enlightenment.
• He became a Buddhist, shaved his head and wore traditional Indian clothes.
• He came back to Atari and along with his friend Steve Wozniak, reduced the circuit board by 50 chips.
• At thew age of 21, he founded Apple inc. along with Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne
• In 1983, he lured John Sculley away from Pepsi Cola to serve as Apple's CEO.
• In may 1985, the board of director's sided with Sculley and removed Jobs from management duties. Jobs resigned 5 months later.
• Jobs founded NeXT computers in 1985 with $7,000,000.
• Jobs bought The Graphic Group(now Pixar) in 1986.
• NeXT was aquired by Apple in 1997 and saw the return of Jobs to Apple.
• Many animated movies were made by Pixar, which became box-office hits.
• In 2000, Jobs became CEO of Apple.
• In 2006, The Walt Disney Company acquired Pixar, making Jobs the largest single shareholder with 7% stakes.
• Under Jobs, Apple created the iTunes store, iPod, iPhone, iPad
• In august 2011, he resigned as CEO of Apple, but remained as the chairman.
• Jobs died on October 5th, 2011 in his house, due to pancreatic cancer.
• He is considered as one of the greatest inventor of our time.

Nobel Prize

• The Nobel Prize is give annually in recognition of scientific and cultural advances.
• Alfred Nobel established this awards in 1895.
• The awards are given in the following fields

1. Physics
2. Chemistry
3. Peace
4. Philosophy
5. Medicine
6. Literature

• The Peace prize is given in Oslo, whereas the others are given in Stockholm.
• Alfred Nobel was a chemist and is credited as the inventor of Dynamite.
• He was discouraged by the reaction of people after his discovery.
• He set aside 94% of his assets to be used for Nobel Prizes in his will.
• The Nobel Foundation was founded in 1900 as a private organization to manage the finances and administration of Nobel prizes.
• The award was first given in 1900.
• The award consists of a Medal, Diploma Certificate and Cash Prize.
• The Medal weighs 175 grams and is made of 18 Carat gold. Previously until 1980, it was made of 23 Carat gold.
• The Diploma Certificate consists of the achievement of the person and is specially designed differently for each person.
• The cash prize differs slightly each year. It is currently $1.4 million. If more then one person wins the prize, the money is shared. But, it cant be shared by more than 3 people.
• The Nobel prize is regarded as the most prestigious award for each field.
  
  

Bodhidharma

Painting of Bodhidharma

Suriya as Bhodhidharma in the tamil movie 7aam Arivu

• Bodhidharma was a buddhist monk who lived in the 6th century.
• He is credited as transmitter of Zen from India to China.
• Zen is derived from the sanskrit word Dharma which means Meditation
• Bodhidharma was born in Kanchipuram in TamilNadu in India.
• He was a Tamil prince from Pallava empire
• After becoming a Buddhist, he traveled to china as there was a strong trade between pallavas and the chinese at that time.
• Throughout Buddhist art, he is depicted as a rather ill-tempered, profusely bearded and wide eyed person.
• He is often popularly considered to be the creator of the shaolin monastery's arts and was a great expert in Martial Arts
• He combined the already existent martial arts in china with his own knowledge to create KungFu.