2500 BC Indus seals a mystery
The delicate seals of the Indus civilization are in a script as yet undeciphered

2500 BC Cotton garments in India
Yarns of spun cotton survive at Mohenjo-daro, one of the two great cities of the Indus civilization

2500 BC Civilization along Indus river
Harappa becomes one of the main cities of the Indus civilization

2000 BC Water buffalo in India
The water buffalo, domesticated somewhere in southeast Asia, features on the seals of the Indus civilization

2000 BC Elephants put to work in India
The elephant is tamed in the Indus civilization

1500 BC Aryans move into India
Indo-European tribes, known collectively as Aryans, enter India from the northwest

1500 BC Brahmans as priestly caste
The Aryans bring into India the roots of Hinduism, with the Brahmans as a priestly caste

1500 BC Sanskrit literature begins with Rigveda
Sacrificial hymns of the Aryans, gathered in the Rigveda, become the earliest Sanskrit literature

600 BC Hindu ashrams
Hindu hermits live in groups described as ashramas

550 BC Sinhalese move into Sri Lanka
The Sinhalese, after moving south through India, cross into Sri Lanka

550 BC Plastic surgery in India
The Indian physician Susruta pioneers plastic surgery of the nose

550 BC Indian doctors identify three humours
Indian medical theory maintains that the body consists of three humours - spirit, phlegm and bile

500 BC Upanishads reflect Hindu mysticism
The Upanishads, written over a long period from oral tradition, are the mystical texts of early Hinduism

470 BC Jain leader leaves home
Vardhamana, an Indian prince, leaves home to live as a beggar - at the start of the Jain religion

430 BC Siddartha Gautama leaves home
Siddartha Gautama, a prince in Nepal, leaves home to become a wandering ascetic

424 BC Buddha preaches first sermon
Gautama Buddha preaches his first sermon, at Sarnath, setting out the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path

424 BC Gautama enlightened
Gautama, after a night of meditation under a pipal tree at Buddh Gaya, is 'enlightened' and becomes the Buddha

420 BC Order of Buddhist monks
Buddha introduces a vigorous tradition of monasticism, in the order of Buddhist monks known as Sangha

400 BC Magadha dominant in India
The kingdom of Magadha, with its capital at Rajgir (near modern Patna), emerges as the dominant power in north India

350 BC Mahabharata assumes epic proportions
The Mahabharata, India's great national epic, begins to take shape

327 BC Alexander invades India
Alexander takes a major new step, leaving Persian territory and moving through the mountain passes into India

321 BC Chandragupta Maurya rules
Chandragupta Maurya seizes the throne of Magadha, in India, and establishes the Mauryan dynasty

300 BC Vishnu, Shiva and Brahma
Vishnu, Shiva and Brahma emerge as India's trio of main gods, with the Vedic religion of the Aryans evolving into Hinduism

300 BC Ramayana tells romance of Rama
The Indian epic of romance and adventure, the Ramayana, is probably the work of a single author at about this time

272 BC Asoka creates first Indian empire
Asoka, a devotee of Buddhism, wins the Mauryan throne and establishes India's first empire

250 BC Asoka favours Buddhism
Asoka, extending his rule over much of India, proclaims his Buddhist faith on pillars and in rock inscriptions

250 BC Arabic numerals in India
The digits known now as Arabic numerals make their first tentative appearance in India

250 BC Buddhism reaches Sri Lanka
Buddhism reaches Sri Lanka as a result of the missionary efforts of the Indian ruler, Asoka

200 BC Stirrups for big toes
Indian cavalrymen ride with their big toes in loops of leather or fabric - a first step towards the stirrup

100 BC Tradition of voluptuous Hindu sculpture
Hindu temple sculptors develop a sinuous and full-bodied style for the naked female form

50 BC Stupa at Sanchi
The Great Stupa at Sanchi is the earliest surviving Buddhist stupa

50 BC Jain dispute over nudity
A doctrinal split emerges within Jainism over whether a devotee must go naked (sky clad) or may be allowed a simple robe (white clad)

100 Gandhara sculpture
A naturalistic style of Buddhist sculpture develops in the Gandhara region, part of modern Pakistan

120 Kanishka rules in Peshawar
Kanishka rules the Kushan empire of Afghanistan and northern India from his capital at Peshawar

320 Chandra Gupta extends realm
The territory of the Gupta dynasty is extended by Chandra Gupta, to include most of the great plain of the Ganges

380 Kalidasa at Gupta court
Kalidasa, the most distinguished of India's authors in classical Sanskrit, is at the Gupta court in Patna

550 Chess played in India
Chess is first played at about this time, in India, before spreading west to Persia

600 Ajanta's Buddhist murals
The walls of caves at Ajanta are profusely decorated with Buddhist murals

712 Muslims win foothold in India
Muslims, arriving from Persia through Baluchistan, occupy the region of Sind in western India

900 Cholas in southern India
A Tamil kingdom, established by the Cholas, controls the whole of south India and will last for two centuries

900 Zoroastrians become Parsees
Zoroastrians migrate from Muslim Persia to India, where they become known as Parsees

1000 Muslim Turks raid India
Turks from Ghazni, raiding into northwest India, renew the pressure of Islam on the subcontinent

1000 Rajputs in Rajasthan
Warlike tribal groups, calling themselves Rajput and claiming descent from the Aryan warrior caste, are now in Rajasthan

1000 Rock temples at Ellora
Buddhist, Hindu and Jain shrines are carved from the rock in the cave temples of Ellora, in India

1025 Muslims destroy temple at Somnath
Mahmud of Ghazni marches an army across an Indian desert to destroy a great temple at Somnath, killing - it is said - some 50,000 Hindus

1150 Tamils in Sri Lanka
After centuries of raiding the northern part of Sri Lanka, the Tamils establish a settled Hindu presence in the island

1211 Delhi sultanate
The leader of a Turkish army establishes an independent sultanate in Delhi, beginning many centuries of Muslim rule in north India

1336 Hindu empire of Vijayanagara
A Hindu empire in southern India is established with its capital at Vijayanagara, meaning 'city of victory'

1346 Murder ends Hindu rule in Kashmir
Udiana Deva, the last Hindu ruler of Kashmir, is murdered by his Muslim prime minister

1398 Timur sacks Delhi
Timur devastates Delhi and loots treasure to take back to Samarkand on 120 elephants

1498 Vasco da Gama reaches India
Vasco da Gama reaches the southern coast of India, at Calicut, after sailing across the Indian Ocean from east Africa

1500 First Sikh guru
Nanak, the first of the Sikh gurus, takes to the road as a wandering teacher

1502 Da Gama imposes trade agreement
Vasco da Gama wins a trading treaty for Portuguese merchants after bombarding the Indian port of Calicut into submission

1505 Portuguese in Sri Lanka
The Portuguese establish a presence in Sri Lanka, trading in the island's crop of cinammon

1510 Portuguese in Goa
The Portuguese seize Goa and make it their colonial capital in India

1526 Babur wins at Panipat
In a battle at Panipat Babur defeats the sultan of Delhi, launching the Mughal empire in India

1527 Babur wins at Khanua
Victory at Khanua, over a Hindu confederation of Rajput rulers, brings Babur a tenuous control over most of northwest India

1530 Humayun succeeds Babur
The first Mughal emperor, Babur, dies in India and is succeeded by his son, Humayun

1534 Portuguese acquire Bombay
The Portuguese force the local ruler to cede to them the island of Bombay

1542 Francis Xavier in Goa
Francis Xavier reaches Goa, at the start of the great mission to the east that will last the nine years until his death

1543 Humayun driven from India
Humayun, driven west into Afghanistan by Sher Shah, loses his family's new inheritance in India

1555 Humayun wins at Sirhind
Civil war within India enables Humayun to win a battle at Sirhind and recover the Mughal throne

1556 Akbar emperor of India
Humayun dies and Akbar, the greatest of the Mughal emperors, inherits the throne at the age of thirteen

1571 Akbar begins Fatehpur Sikri
Akbar builds his new palace of Fatehpur Sikri close to the shrine of a Sufi saint

1573 Tomb of Humayun in Delhi
The tomb in Delhi of the Mughal emperor Humayun introduces the shape of dome which characterizes his dynasty's architecture

1590 Fifth guru builds Amritsar
Arjan, the fifth Sikh guru, builds many gurdwaras and commences the holy city of Amritsar

1605 Jahangir on Mughal throne
On the death of Akbar, his son Jahangir succeeds to the Mughal throne

1613 English factory at Surat
The British East India establishes a 'factory' (a secure warehouse for the storing of Indian goods) at Surat, on the west coast

1615 First British ambassador to India
Sir Thomas Roe, the first British ambassador to India, arrives at the court of the Mughal emperor Jahangir

1615 Peak of Mughal painting
The Mughal school of painting reaches a peak of perfection in the reign of Jahangir

1632 Shah Jahan ends Mughal tradition of tolerance
Shah Jahan orders that all recently built Hindu temples shall be destroyed, ending the Mughal tradition of religious tolerance

1632 Wife remembered in Taj Mahal
Shah Jahan begins building the Taj Mahal as a memorial for his wife, Mumtaz Mahal

1644 British build fort at Madras
The British East India Company completes the construction of Fort St George in Madras

1646 Shivaji makes first conquest
A young Hindu prince, Shivaji, captures Bijapur in a campaign against Muslim rulers, enabling him to establish the large and long-lasting Maratha empire

1658 Mughal emperor a prisoner in Agra
For the final years of his life the emperor Shah Jahan is held a prisoner, by his son Aurangzeb, in Agra's Red Fort

1668 East India Company acquires Bombay
England's East India Company is granted a lease on Bombay by Charles II, who has received it from his Portuguese bride

1673 Aurangzeb commissions Badshahi Mosque
The Mughal emperor Aurangzeb begins building the great Badshahi Mosque in Lahore

1690 French garrison in Pondicherry
France by now has six fortified trading settlements around the coast of India, of which Pondicherry is the most important

1696 East India Company establishes Calcutta
Fort St William is built by the East India Company in the Ganges delta, and subsequently develops into Calcutta

1699 Tenth guru introduces five Ks
The tenth Sikh guru, Gobind Rai, commits his people to the five Ks, which become the outward signs of their group identity

1704 Granth becomes Sikh guru
The tenth Sikh guru, Gobind Rai, names as his successor the sacred book known as the Granth

1707 Last Great Mughal dies
The death of Aurangzeb introduces the long period of decline of the Mughal empire

1739 Persian shah loots Delhi
The Persian ruler Nadir Shah enters Delhi and removes much of the accumulated treasure of the Mughal empire

1746 French capture Madras
French forces capture the British East India Company's fort of Madras

1751 Siege of Arcot
Robert Clive prevails over the French after holding out during the seven-week siege of Arcot in southern India

1756 Black Hole of Calcutta
122 people die after being locked overnight in a small room in Calcutta, in an incident that becomes known as the Black Hole of Calcutta

1757 Clive interferes in Bengal
Robert Clive defeats the nawab of Bengal at the battle of Plassey, and places his own man on the throne

1799 Ranjit Singh captures Lahore
A Sikh maharajah, Ranjit Singh, captures Lahore and makes it his capital in his campaign to unify the Punjab

1799 Tipu Sultan killed
Tipu Sultan, ruler of Mysore, is killed fighting the British at Seringapatam

1809 Ranjit Singh signs treaty with British
Ranjit Singh, maharaja of the Punjab, agrees an eastern boundary between himself and the British in the Treaty of Amritsar

1817 British officers find Buddhist caves
British officers, hoping to shoot a tiger, come across the forgotten Buddhist caves of Ajanta

1819 Sikhs conquer Kashmir
The Sikh maharajah of the Punjab, Ranjit Singh, conquers Kashmir, beginning a century and a half of Sikh dominance in the region

1845 First Anglo-Sikh War
The first Anglo-Sikh war breaks out between Sikh forces in the Punjab and encroaching forces of Britain's East India Company

1846 First Anglo-Sikh war ends
The first Anglo-Sikh war ends with the Treaty of Lahore, by which Jammu and Kashmir are ceded to the British

1848 Second Anglo-Sikh War
The second Anglo-Sikh war begins when a British army invades the Punjab to suppress a local uprising

1849 British annexe Punjab
A British victory at the Battle of Gujarat effectively ends the second Anglo-Sikh war, and is followed by annexation of the Punjab

1857 Mutiny in India
Animal fat on a new issue of cartridges sparks off the Indian Mutiny, also know as the First War of Indian Independence

1857 Siege of Lucknow ends
After being besieged for five months in Lucknow, the remnants of the British garrison finally escape

1858 British recapture Lucknow
Lucknow is retaken by the British, nearly a year after it fell to the rebels

1858 Indian Mutiny aftermath
The end of the Indian Mutiny is followed by brutal British retaliation

1858 East India Company deprived of powers
The India Act places India under the direct control of the British government, ending the rule of the East India Company

1858 Last Mughal emperor deposed
The last Mughal emperor, Bahadur Shah II, is deposed by the British and exiled to Rangoon, in Burma

1903 Coronation durbar in Delhi
Edward VII, the first British monarch to travel to India, holds a great coronation durbar in Delhi

1906 Muslim League established in India
The All-India Muslim League is set up at a meeting of the Muhammadan Educational Conference in Dhaka

1909 Gandhi publishes Hind Swaraj
Mahatma Gandhi, on a visit to India, publishes a pamphlet entitled Hind Swaraj ("Indian Home Rule")

1911 George V holds durbar in Delhi
The British monarch George V holds a great durbar in Delhi to celebrate his coronation as emperor of India

1912 Tagore's Gitanjali
Rabindranath Tagore publishes a collection of his Bengali poems in Gitanjali

1913 Lutyens' New Delhi
Construction begins on the government buildings in New Delhi, designed by Edwin Lutyens and Herbert 1Baker

1914 Emden terror of the east
from August - the German cruiser Emden carries out successful raids on British shipping in the seas around India

1915 Gandhi returns to India
Mahatma Gandhi returns to India after more than twenty years in South Africa

1919 Massacre at Amritsar
More than 300 die when British troops fire on a peaceful demonstration in Amritsar

1921 Indus valley civilization discovered
The first traces are found of a major but entirely forgotten civilization in the Indus valley

1922 Gandhi given six-year sentence
Mahatma Gandhi is arrested by the British in India as an agitator and is sentenced to six years in prison

1925 Hindu nationalist party formed
The RSS party, from which the present Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) derives, is established in India by Keshava Baliram Hedgewar

1930 Gandhi leads salt march
Mahatma Gandhi leads a 240-mile march from Ahmedabad to the sea to defy the British salt tax, thus launching a campaign of civil disobedience

1931 Hindu-Muslim tensions in Kashmir
Sectarian hostilities increase in Kashmir, with the Muslim majority resenting the favours shown by the British to the Sikh and Hindu elite

1934 Jinnah heads Muslim League
Mohammed Ali Jinnah becomes president of the Muslim League in India

1935 Swami and Friends
R.K. Narayan's novel Swami and Friends is the first set in his fictional town of Malgudi

1940 Jinnah demands regional independence
Mohammed Ali Jinnah puts forward the concept of independent Muslim states within India

1942 Gandhi launches Quit India movement
Mahatma Gandhi launches the Quit India Movement, calling on a large crowd in Bombay to 'do or die' in the struggle to expel the British

1942 Gandhi imprisoned
Mahatma Gandhi and nearly all the leaders of India's Congress party are arrested and will remain in prison until the end of the war

1947 Partition of India
In granting independence to India, Britain partitions the subcontinent along sectarian lines into Pakistan and the republic of India

1947 Viceroy Mountbatten now governor-general
Louis Mountbatten, the last viceroy of India, becomes also the first governor-general

1947 Nehru is prime minister
Jawaharlal Nehru becomes prime minister of the newly independent republic of India

1947 Jinnah is governor-general
Muslim leader Mohammed Ali Jinnah becomes the first governor-general of the new state of Pakistan

1947 Muslim defiance of Kashmir ruler
Muslims proclaim an independent state in west Kashmir, defying the wishes of the maharaja

1947 First war between India and Pakistan
Violent sectarian division in Kashmir results in war between India and Pakistan in support of the rival sides

1948 Gandhi assassinated
Mahatma Gandhi is assassinated at a Delhi prayer meeting by a Hindu extremist, Nathuram Godse

1949 Cease-fire line in Kashmir
The first Indo-Pakistani war ends with a Kashmir demarcation line approved by the UN but acceptable to neither state

1950 Le Corbusier develops Chandigarh
Le Corbusier begins a 15-year project designing Chandigarh as a new joint capital for Punjab and Hariyana

1952 Mother Teresa in Calcutta
Albanian missionary Mother Teresa opens the Nirmal Hriday, or Kalighat Home for Dying Destitutes, in Calcutta

1953 Everest conquered
New Zealander Edmund Hillary and the Sherpa Tenzing Norgay stand together on the top of Everest

1955 Pather Panchali
Indian director Satyajit Ray makes his first film, Pather Panchali

1958 Ayub Khan seizes power in Pakistan
Ayub Khan, commander-in-chief of the Pakistani army, replaces Iskander Mirza as president in a bloodless coup

1959 Bandaranaike assassinated
Solomon Bandaranaike is assassinated by a Buddhist monk after only three years as prime minister of Sri Lanka

1959 Dalai Lama flees to India
The Dalai Lama escapes from Tibet to India after the Chinese suppression of an armed uprising costing thousands of Buddhist lives

1960 Mrs Bandaranaike in husband's footsteps
Sirimavo Bandaranaike, widow of the assassinated Solomon Bandaranaike, begins the first of three long spells as prime minister of Sri Lanka

1962 China and India at war
China prevails in a five-week war with India over disputed boundaries

1965 Second war between India and Pakistan
After a summer of border skirmishes in Pakistan, an Indian advance towards Lahore initiates full-scale war between the two countries

1965 Cease-fire in Indo-Pakistan war
A UN-sponsored cease-fire brings the second Indo-Pakistan war to an end after less than three weeks

1966 Indira Gandhi is prime minister
Nehru's daughter, Indira Gandhi, becomes India's prime minister as leader of the Congress party

1966 Autonomy demanded for East Pakistan
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, leader of the Awami League, demands full autonomy for East Pakistan (Bangladesh)

1969 Ayub Khan stands down
Pakistan's president Ayub Khan hands over power to another general, Yahya Khan, who introduces martial law

1970 Mujibur Rahman wins East Pakistan election
Mujibur Rahman and his Awami League win on an independence platform in the election in East Pakistan

1970 Bhutto wins in West Pakistan
In the Pakistan election, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto wins a clear majority in West Pakistan

1970 Troops sent to East Pakistan
The outgoing Pakistan government, led by Yahya Khan, rejects the election result and sends troops to East Pakistan

1971 Rahman proclaims independent Bangladesh
Awami League leader Mujibur Rahman declares unilaterally that Bangladesh (East Pakistan) is an independent state

1971 Sitar concerto by Ravi Shankar
Indian sitar-player Ravi Shankar composes the first of his two concertos for sitar and orchestra

1971 Civil war in East Pakistan
The arrest of Mujibur Rahman, together with brutal attempts at repression, turn resistance in East Pakistan into full-scale civil war

1971 India interevenes in Pakistan's war
India intervenes in the Pakistan civil war on the side of East Pakistan, the future Bangladesh

1971 Pakistan defeated
Pakistan surrenders to India within a month of Indian intervention in the war to suppress East Pakistan

1971 Bangladesh independent
With the end of the war between Pakistan and India, East Pakistan becomes independent as Bangladesh

1971 Bhutto leads new separated Pakistan
Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto takes over as president of Pakistan, now consisting only of its western half

1972 Rahman prime minister of Bangladesh
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman returns from prison in West Pakistan to become prime minister of the newly independent state of Bangladesh

1977 Bhutto ousted in Pakistan
Zia ul-Haq, the Chief of Army Staff, takes power in a bloodless coup against the government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto

1979 Bhutto hanged
Ex-president Zulfikar Ali Bhutto is executed in Pakistan for allegedly authorizing the murder of a political opponent

1980 Hindu nationalist party becomes BJP
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerges in India from previous Hindu nationalist groups and wins the first of several general ellections in 1996

1981 Midnight's Children
Salman Rushdie's novel Midnight's Children uses the moment of India's independence to launch an adventure in magic realism

1983 Tamil Tigers rebel
The Tamil Tigers launch a civil war against the Sinhalese majority in Sri Lanka

1984 Sikhs seize Golden Temple
Sikh rebels, demanding an independent Punjab, seize the Golden Temple in Amritsar

1984 Troops invade Golden Temple
Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi uses the army to dislodge militant Sikhs occupying the Golden Temple in Amritsar

1984 Mrs Gandhi assassinated
Indira Gandhi is assassinated in Delhi by members of her Sikh bodyguard, in retaliation for the desecration of the Golden Temple

1984 Rajiv Gandhi is prime minister
Rajiv Gandhi succeeds his mother as leader of the Congress party and prime minister of India

1984 Bhopal chemical disaster
More than 2000 die in the Indian city of Bhopal when toxic gas escapes from a Union Carbide plant

1988 Benazir Bhutto is prime minister
35-year-old Benazir Bhutto, daughter of the executed president, leads a coalition government in Pakistan

1990 Bhutto government dismissed
Benazir Bhutto's government is dismissed on corruption charges and her party loses the resulting elections

1991 Rajiv Gandhi assassinated
Rajiv Gandhi is killed near Chennai, during an election campaign, by a suicide bomber on behalf of Tamil militants

1993 A Suitable Boy
Vikram Seth publishes his novel A Suitable Boy, a family saga in post-independence India

1993 Bhutto comeback
After only three years in opposition, Benazir Bhutto wins a second term as prime minister of Pakistan

1996 Bhutto dismissed again
Benazir Bhutto is dismissed from government in Pakistan for a second time, again on corruption charges

1997 The God of Small Things
Indian author Arundhati Roy publishes her first novel, The God of Small Things

1999 Musharraf seizes power
A Pakistani general, Pervez Musharraf, takes power in a military coup

2001 Earthquake in Gujarat
An earthquake kills about 20,000 people in the region of Bhuj in the Indian state of Gujarat

2001 Royal massacre in Nepal
Crown Prince Dipendra kills nine members of his own royal family at the court of Nepal

2005 Massive earthquake in Kashmir
An earthquake kills more than 70,000 people in inaccessible regions near Muzaffarabad in the Pakistan part of Kashmir

2006 Terrorist bombs in Bombay
A series of coordinated terrorist bombs explode on trains during the crowded evening rush hour in Mumbai (Bombay)

2016 January 4-5 Record cricket score
The highest ever recorded individual cricket score, 1,009 not out, is made by Pranav Dhanawade.