NCERT Solutions for Class 6th Social Science Chapter 5 India That Is Bharat
Updated on 2026-09-19
About this chapter
India is a modern nation, but this land is far older than the nation. Today India has defined borders, defined states and a known population. Five hundred, two thousand or five thousand years ago it looked very different. The region as a whole — the part of the world we call the Indian Subcontinent — has had many different names and shifting boundaries , and we learn about them from ancient texts, from the accounts of travellers and pilgrims, and from inscriptions. The Subcontinent has clear natural boundaries (Fig. 5.2, page 76). In the north stand the Himalayas ; in the north-west, the Hindu Kush . The Arabian Sea lies to the west, the Bay of Bengal to the east and the Indian Ocean to the south. Between them lie the great river systems the map names — the Indus with the Jhelum, Chenab, R
- Chapter opening
- How Indians Named India
- Don't Miss Out
- How Foreigners Named India
- The chapter in three points
- End-of-chapter exercise
Quick revision
| Name or term | What it means | Where it appears in the chapter | Who used it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Indian Subcontinent | The region of the world that today holds India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka and the Maldives; it has had many names and shifting boundaries | Page 77; physical map Fig. 5.2, page 76 | The name we use today |
| Sindhu | The Indus River — or, at times, a river in general | Page 77 | Ṛig Veda and later Indian texts |
| Sapta Sindhava | ‘Land of the seven rivers’ — the name for the north-west region of the Subcontinent only, not the whole of it | Page 77, with Fig. 5.3 | The Ṛig Veda, India's most ancient text |
| Bhāratavarṣha | ‘The country of the Bharatas’ — a name that clearly extends to the entire Subcontinent | Page 78 | The Mahābhārata |
| Bharata | The name of one of the main Vedic groups of people; later, of several kings | Page 78 | First in the Ṛig Veda, then in later literature |
| Jambudvīpa | ‘The island of the fruit of the jamun tree’ (also called jambul or Malabar plum), a tree native to India | Pages 78–79 | The Mahābhārata; and Aśhoka, c. 250 BCE, in an inscription |
| Bhārata / Bharat / Bharatam | “The country that lies north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains” | Page 80, quoting the Viṣhṇu Purāṇa | Used all over India even today — Bharat in the north, Bharatam in the south |
| Constitution | A document that spells out the basic principles and laws of a nation | Margin note, page 81 | The Indian Constitution came into force in 1950 and opens with ‘India, that is Bharat’ (Fig. 5.5) |
| Hind / Hidu / Hindu | Adaptations of ‘Sindhu’ in the Persian language; in ancient Persian a purely geographical term, not a religious one | Page 81 | The Persians, from the 6th century BCE |
| Indoi / Indike | ‘Hindu’ with the initial ‘h’ dropped, because Greek had no such letter | Page 81 | The ancient Greeks, working from Persian sources |
| Yintu / Yindu / Tianzhu | Chinese words for India, also from ‘Sindhu’; ‘Tianzhu’ could also be read as ‘heavenly master’ | Pages 81 and 83 | The ancient Chinese, who respected India as the land of the Buddha |
| Hindustān | A more recent term for the Indian Subcontinent, first used in a Persian inscription some 1,800 years ago | Page 83 | Persian; later the term used by most invaders of India |
Exercises
- Chapter opening — The Big Questions Page 75
- Reading the physical map of the Indian Subcontinent (Fig. 5.2) — THINK ABOUT IT Page 77
- How Indians Named India — LET'S EXPLORE Page 78
- How Indians Named India — In-text Questions Page 78
- How Indians Named India — THINK ABOUT IT Page 80
- How Indians Named India — In-text Questions Page 80
- Don't Miss Out — LET'S EXPLORE Page 81
- How Foreigners Named India — LET'S EXPLORE Page 83
- The chapter in three points — Before we move on ... Page 84
- End-of-chapter exercise — Questions, activities and projects Page 84