Among the 20th century’s stirring speeches is Nehru’s ‘Tryst with Destiny’ address to the Constituent Assembly at midnight, August 14, 1947, marking the transition to freedom. Laying out the vision for free India in 820 words, India’s first PM talked of peace and service, foregrounding the themes of welfare and security in public discourse.

“The light has gone out of our lives and there is darkness everywhere…”
— Jawaharlal Nehru, on Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination on January 30, 1948

A radical thinker rarely in agreement with Gandhians and Congress, BR Ambedkar was still appointed law minister in Nehru’s first cabinet and tasked with raising a framework for modern India. He chose to underpin it with the principles of equality and justice, placing emphasis on individual rights rather than traditions, communities, and ideology. The idea of a strong Centre within a federal system of governance were also underscored through his arguments.

The language question loomed large much before states were reorganized on linguistic lines. From the 1930s, Periyar opposed Rajaji’s efforts to popularise Hindi in Tamil Nadu (Madras Presidency), and later DMK turned the stir into a movement that swept them to power.

Pather Panchali, Satyajit Ray’s lyrical debut feature (1955), put India on the map of world cinema and became the benchmark for every aspiring Indian auteur.

India had 12 five-year plans for the economy since 1951.
Although scrapped in favour of Niti Aayog’s three-year action plans, the USSR-inspired plans are the reason one can drive from Kashmir to Kanyakumari without starving on the way.

In 1957, the first-ever elected communist government was formed in Kerala with EMS becoming the chief minister. Invoking Article 356, PM Nehru dismissed the EMS govt in 1959, after it initiated radical land reforms and an overhaul of the education system.

Massive hydel projects (Bhakra Nangal, Hirakud) built in the 1950s-60s became emblems of Nehruvian development. They set the stage for the Green Revolution but lost their sheen by the 1990s, and activists campaigned actively against them.

The Indian Army, its reputation burnished by WWII, was handed a morale-wrecking defeat in the Himalayas by China’s PLA which came with overwhelming numbers and superior firepower. The Army’s prestige was crushed, as was Nehru’s spirit.

The summer of ’67 uprising by peasants and tea garden workers in the picture-postcard north Bengal village of Naxalbari created the template for armed, radical Left movements that continue to thrive in swathes of India Ignored.

India’s first superfast, fully air-conditioned train, Rajdhani Express, charged out of New Delhi in 1969, and musafirs developed a taste for complimentary meals. Train travel was no longer only about getting somewhere; it was also about the journey.

Two series Test wins abroad in 1971 by captain Ajit Wadekar’s merry men, against the formidable Sobers-led West Indies (1-0) and the respectable Illingworth-managed England (1-0), raised the profile of cricket in India like never before.

The only decisive war India ever fought, 1971 saw India flex both military and diplomatic muscle successfully and establish itself as a regional power. Bangladesh was born as was the icon named Indira.

India joined the nuclear club with an underground explosion in Pokhran, Rajasthan, on May 18, 1974. Codenamed Smiling Buddha, the tests caused global consternation, but it upgraded India’s status as a military power. Pokhran II happened in May 1998.

India’s journey to become the world’s leading milk producer parallels the life of Verghese Kurien, a mechanical engineer turned-dairy-expert. He created a grid of milk cooperatives that remains the prototype for agri initiatives.

From the 1960s, the government promoted use of high-yield seeds, chemical fertilisers and irrigation to improve foodgrain production and achieve self-sufficiency in food.

It started as a students’ movement against the corrupt Bihar government. Indira Gandhi’s measures to suppress it made the movement and its leader, Jayaprakash Narayan, the nucleus of countrywide resistance to her rule, leading to the Emergency in 1975, and her electoral loss two years later.

The act of 27 Garhwali women hugging trees to stop them from being felled in 1974 became a stencil for non-violent resistance for people’s control over natural resources. Led by Sunderlal Bahuguna, the Chipko movement inspired several environmental movements, including the Narmada anti-dam agitation.

Binge-watching predates the internet. It dawned in the 1980s with VCRs (video cassette recorder) and tapes. Movie buffs, bored of DD’s Sunday evening films, had the option of renting a VCR and three tapes from the neighbourhood ‘parlour’ for an all-nighter. It was always a social event with friends and immediate neighbours invited.

Through the 1980s and early 1990s Punjab was a dangerous place where terror was cloaked in religion. The militants wanted Khalistan, a separate country for Sikhs. Their chief, Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale, was killed in Operation Blue Star (1984). Estimated casualties of civilians, terrorists and security forces between 1981 and 1992 were more than 21,000.

NTR chose mythological roles while MGR donned a Robin Hood avatar. NTR was a novice; MGR was an Annadurai admirer. Both became CMs. Neither cared for inner-party democracy; both swore by populist schemes. Their cultivation of attire and manner and their autocratic style continue to inspire others.

India’s most memorable sporting triumphs were heard on radio, seldom seen. But the unlikely 1983 triumph of Kapil’s Devils over domineering Windies was watched live on TV and, later, on VCRs, across the country taking cricket to small-town and mofussil India like never before.

On the night of December 3-4, 1984, the world’s worst industrial disaster killed 20,000 and injured 5.5 lakh people over the years. It forever changed the way industrial safety, compensation and litigation worked the world over.

The storming of Sikhism’s holiest shrine, Harmandir Sahib, during Operation Blue Star galled the Sikhs, and just five months later, on October 31, 1984, PM Indira Gandhi’s Sikh bodyguards Satwant Singh and Beant Singh shot her from point-blank range at her New Delhi residence. After that, Sikhs were targeted by mobs across northern states and thousands were killed.

Conceived by Sanjay Gandhi to rival the Ambassador and Fiat, Maruti added wheels to the middle-class dream in the 1980s. Powered by an 800cc engine, it became the people’s car that everyone aspired for. The Indo-Japanese company still commands over 50% of marketshare in automobiles.

Barring specialists in scientific institutions, computers meant little to anyone in the early ’80s. But Rajiv Gandhi, pilot by training, stressed on tech-telecom missions to give engineering R&D and education a boost in the midst of a US embargo. India’s IT majors and the startup ecosystem were catalysed in this soup.

The Ramjanmabhoomi movement led by the Hindutva brigade climaxed with the demolition of a medieval mosque in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992. Riots followed, the worst being in India’s commercial heart Mumbai. For some, the event challenged the idea of Nehru’s India.

Through the second half of the 1980’s, India battled a foreign currency shortage. By the end of the decade, it was on the verge of defaulting on payments for imports: it had just enough foreign exchange to cover three weeks of imports. The situation forced RBI to raise a loan of $405 million by pledging its gold reserves and physically transferring it to London. The news focused attention on the crisis in the Indian economy.

In the backdrop of an economic crisis, India was reinvented with finance minister Manmohan Singh’s milestone budget (PM PV Narasimha Rao, 1991) and P Chidambaram’s dream budget (PM HD Deve Gowda, 1997) to open up new areas for private sector participation and reduce bureaucratic controls on them. It led to India’s most economically vibrant period with an eightfold increase over 25 years in the economy’s size and catalysed social change.

A chain of explosions rocked Mumbai in the aftermath of the Babri demolition, set off by a gang executing orders from India’s Most Wanted, Dawood Ibrahim. The death toll was 257 and 713 were injured. The attack, the deadliest on an Indian city, left a deep impact on Mumbai’s psyche and led to an unending criminal trial.

Rajiv Gandhi as PM tried to stem ethnic conflicts, but mediation in Sri Lanka and sending troops to enforce peace turned the LTTE against him. A brutal, secessionist outfit which until then had used Tamil Nadu as a safe haven, it put a suicide bomber at a rally he addressed. Congress did rebound, but a vacuum remained.

Cable TV broke Doordarshan’s monopoly of eyeballs in the early ’90s when private channels brought Bold and Beautiful, WWF, CNN (first Gulf war) and other emblems of Americana to our homes. The idea of entertainment transformed, spawning lifestyle and lingo shifts. Now, with data becoming cheap, TV viewing seems set for another tectonic shift.

In pre-liberalisation India, government jobs were the middle-class’s mainstay. And Prime Minister VP Singh’s decision to implement the decade-old Mandal Commission Report which extended caste-based reservations to OBCs riled millions. Following the self-immolation of DU student Rajeev Goswami, violent protests engulfed north India. But VP’s move turned out to be a permanent political game changer.

The 10th chief election commissioner, TN Seshan (1990-96), changed Indian elections forever. Despite political resistance he implemented laws for codes of conduct, election expenses, use of propaganda material, etc. Under him, the Election Commission finally acquired its independence.

Dalits, or Harijans as they were generally referred to, were considered to be part of the Congress ‘vote bank’ till Kanshi Ram and his associate Mayawati welded them into a self-aware political grouping, transfiguring north Indian politics.

Under Rajiv Gandhi, telephone and STD booths mushroomed. Telecom revolution 2.0 got underway in 1995 when West Bengal’s Leftist chief minister Jyoti Basu made the first call on a mobile phone, the ultimate status symbol then. A minute’s call (Rs 24) cost as much as a litre of petrol. Today calls are almost free and rickshaw pullers could own a cellphone, even a smartphone. Telecom subscribers number over a billion. Only one thing is lost: privacy.

The parallel cinema movement began in the late 1960s but flourished in the 1970s and 1980s, nurtured by the likes of Shyam Benegal and Govind Nihalani, and actors Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah, Smita Patil and Shabana Azmi. Together they provided an alternative to mainstream Bollywood. Southern cinema saw a resurgence through the works of Adoor Gopalakrishnan, G Aravindan and Girish Kasaravalli.

Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things won the Booker Prize in 1997. A literary and commercial success, it opened up avenues for Indian authors writing in English and started the era of big book advances in the country. It also gave India its best known political activist and voice of conscience.

Though a low-intensity conflict, Kargil 1999 was a stab in India’s back at a time when it was trying to make a new beginning with Pakistan after the Lahore declaration between Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his Pakistan counterpart Nawaz Sharif. Himalayan heights lost had to be recaptured at a great cost of men and material.

The new temples of new India, over 500 malls and 2,200 multiplex screens have combined to revolutionise the way urban and small-town India shops and entertains itself.

“One of the greatest diseases is to be nobody to anybody”
– Mother Teresa

The year was 1994 and a popular model with gorgeous grey-green eyes was billed as the favourite to win Miss India. Not only did the little-known 18-year-old Sushmita Sen steal the national pageant, she went on to win Miss Universe. Aishwarya Rai had to console herself with the Miss World title. Others who brought home titles were Diana Hayden, Lara Dutta, and Priyanka Chopra, among others. These pageant victories inspired millions of girls, both in cosmopolitan as well as smalltown India, to work out for that model bod. And it spawned the multi-million-rupee beauty industry across the country.

Critics panned Chetan Bhagat for his tacky turn of phrase, but he wrote and spoke the lingo of the young, urban, aspirational Indian. His paperbacks, priced at Rs 99 a piece, became bestsellers, and birthed the sub-genre of Indian easy-read fiction in English. Bhagat is now university course material, proving today’s India is full of possibilities.

If cricket is religion in India, then match-fixing is the ultimate sin. In 2000, Delhi Police took the lid off what was cricket’s worst kept secret. Among those who had to face the music were top cricketers such as captain Mohd Azharuddin, Ajay Sharma and Ajay Jadeja. None of them were charged but they never played for India again.

The drowning of over 300 South Asians, 170 of them Indians, on Dec 25-26, 1996, was the worst loss of life in the Mediterranean since World War II. It awakened the world to the problem of illegal migration. Thousands more have died since. The journeys of death continue.

“Take the stones people throw at you and use them to build a monument”
— Ratan Tata, Industrialist

Terrorists sent by boat from Karachi landed in Mumbai on November 26, 2008, got past layers of security and unleashed a bloodbath on the streets, in a hospital and railway station, cafes and hotels. It went on for three days. The toll touched 166 before all but one were killed. It was a wakeup call for the police, military and intelligence agencies.

Few laws have empowered ordinary people as The Right to Information Act, which yanked open the Steel Frame of India in 2005. Around 1.75 crore RTIs — 4,800 a day — have been filed in the past decade. Many queries are stonewalled but in several cases, notably Mumbai’s Adarsh Society scam, RTI shook the establishment. The question of transparency has reached the doors of the judiciary and political parties as well. So far the information commission’s attempts to define them as “public authorities” in a bid to make them disclose assets or their working style has been met with resistance. But many Supreme Court judges have sought to promote a climate of accountability by revealing how much they are worth.

Founded in 2007 by IIT graduates Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal to sell books online, Flipkart not only changed the way India shopped but also showed the world that India was ready for tech entrepreneurs to build billion-dollar companies. With SoftBank investing $2.5 billion, FlipKart can now reach for the stars.

On November 8, 2016, PM Narendra Modi launched India’s third demonetisation drive, after 1946 and 1978, to flush out black money. It wiped out 86% of the currency in circulation overnight and caused serpentine queues outside ATMs and banks. After-effects included suffering agro markets, job losses, drop in real estate demand and — surprise, surprise — a sweeping victory for the BJP in the 2017 UP polls.

In a career spanning five decades, versatile director Yash Chopra delivered blockbusters such as Deewar, Kabhi Kabhie and Dil To Paagal Hai, effortlessly bending his craft to the mood of the time. His Yash Raj films, which has produced hits like DDLJ, the Dhoom series and Sultan, is one of the biggest banners in Bollywood.

“Till the full stop doesn’t come, the sentence is not complete…”
— MS Dhoni

Baba Ramdev’s rise as India’s chief yoga evangelist started 15 years ago with a TV show that was equal parts fitness and spirituality. Nobody foresaw that the saffron-clad Baba would transform into India’s biggest FMCG phenomenon, challenging MNCs, and emerge a political player, mocking the epitaph some wrote after his escape from Ramlila Maidan in a woman’s garb.

Narendra Modi’s charisma pulled India out of the mire of coalition politics after 25 years — his is the first non-Congress government to enjoy a majority in Lok Sabha — and his vote-catching appeal only seems to grow despite controversial economic measures such as demonetisation.