India, a nation with several cultures, religions and a million inventions. Aryabhatt, who gave Zero to the world was an Indian to Dr Jagdish Chandra Bose, who quantified the fact that there is life in plants too; Indians have always been at the forefront of innovations. But there are some inventions which have become the part of our lifestyle and still, we have no idea about who invented them.
It is surprising, but all these inventions happened in India.
Shampoo
The word shampoo in English has come from Britain but derived from the Hindi word champo. Incipiently, the meaning of the word shampoo is hair massage or head massage.
The term shampoo and its service were ushered in Britain by a Bengali impresario Sake Deen Mohammed during 1814. In England Mohammed and his Irish wife started a business of shampoo bath and named it “Mohammed’s Indian Vapour Bath”. Here customers received the treatment of champi (hair massage or shampooing). The service was gaining popularity everywhere and received high appreciation by being appointed as the ‘Shampoo Surgeon’ of both the George lV and William lV.
Flush Toilet
Overwhelmed? We were too! It was Indus Valley Civilization that used water for toilets for the first time. There was a flush toilet in almost every house in Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro. These toilets were attached to an amalgamate sewage system. Now we know, from where the idea of using water for sanitation came.
Diamond
Diamonds were discovered in India in 800 BC and used as a gemstone. They were also used for many other purposes like cutting tools, making weapons and much more. During 327 BC, it was Alexander the great who brought the first diamond from India to Europe. At that time, India was the only country blessed with diamond mines and did business with it in the whole world. The first diamond mining was tracked down to the mines near Golconda river in India.
Ink
Ink in India was introduced in 4th century BC and was called as Masi. At that time, the ink was mélange of several substances.The unearthed Indian documents are written in Kharosthi with such ink. The practice of writing with ink and sharp needles was first started in Tamil and other Dravidian languages. Several Buddhist and Jain scripts were compiled with the ink in India. In India, the carbon black form of ink was formulated by burning bones, tar, pitches and other substance.
Suit Games
In India card games or suit games were introduced by Mughals during the 16th century. The Mughal emperors from south Asia were fond of playing game ‘Ganjifa’. The first reference of the game was found in the biography of Babar. The game was played with an effusive set of cards that were made with several tortoise shells and decorated with precious stone.
With the passage of time, this game became common among general people in the country with the availability of inexpensive cards. The adornment, style and the arrangement of the card sets were always different. It depends on the artisan who made the cards. For example, the “Dashavatara” deck of Ganjifa had different designs based on ten different avatars of Lord Vishnu.
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