India was shook by the recent attacks on the CRPF personnel recently at Pulwama, Attacks of such nature is nothing new to the Asian Giant and we have been through worse and we'll shrug this off too.
We at the Indian Idealist Condemn this and just to raise the spirit of the nation we'd like to share a few facts with our readers.
The part about this attacks that strikes one the most is this is that this is probably the first one this year with the such high causalities. An one which has just woken up the ancient juggernaut of an Army for this year. Knowing the Indian Army this is not going to be swept under the rug.
Now for a few historical facts on the Indian Army:
- Did you know that the Indian Army is an institution that is older than the country itself, The Republic of India was formed on 15th August 1947 while the Indian Army; Then called the British Indian Army was in existence since 1776 which is around the same time the 13 original colonies which formed the original United States gained Independence.
- Indian Army has been to more wars and had resolved more conflicts before it joined the Union, than after it became part of India, which might seem obvious but when you recount the number of wars and battle experience of an Army it can be said that the Indian Army is an ancient powerhouse.
Wiki Excerpt: The British Indian Army was a critical force for the primacy of the British Empire both in India and across the world. Besides maintaining the internal security of the British Raj, the Army fought in many other theatres: the Anglo-Burmese Wars, First and Second Anglo-Sikh Wars, First, Second and Third Anglo-Afghan Wars, First and Second Opium Wars in China, Abyssinia, and the Boxer Rebellion in China.
- We all know that the British Empire's seat of power in Asia was India which meant they controlled most of the Empires South East Asian Wing through the Indian Army at the time. The Indian Army at the time was divided by Presidencies - The Madras, Bombay and Bengal which were the regional powerhouses at the time. Please refer to the table below for more info regarding the various divisions under British India.
- Indian Army took part in both the World Wars as part of the British Empire the numbers ranger from 1.3 million in the WW1 to 2.4 million in WW2, Indian Army was the largest volunteer force in both the wars of course this was a time when the word India meant the unison of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Burma(Myanmar) and Sri Lanka.
- British Indian Army began with the formation of the Prince of Wales Royal Indian Military College (now known as Rashtriya Indian Military College (RIMC)) at Dehradun in March 1912 with the purpose of providing education to the scions of aristocratic and well-to-do Indian families, and to prepare selected Indian boys for admission into the Royal Military College, Sandhurst which was one of the premier institutes were the military leaders of the Empire were trained.
Flag of the modern Indian Army:
These are some of the lesser known facts about the Indian Army, The protectors of the "Children of the Mighty Himalayas and the Raging Oceans". Hope you enjoyed this article, Do leave comments and feedback, Follow this blog for more.
References:
- Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. IV (1908), The Indian Empire, Administrative, Published under the authority of His Majesty's Secretary of State for India in Council, Oxford at the Clarendon Press. Pp. xxx, 1 map, 552
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Army
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Indian_Army
- https://www.indiatimes.com%2Fnews%2Findia%2Fthis-video-beautifully-illustrates-the-history-of-india-from-2800-bc-to-2016_-255787.html
Comments
Post a Comment