Class 6 Social Science Chapter 5, India, That Is Bharat, traces how the Indian Subcontinent—bounded by the Himalayas, Hindu Kush and the seas—was named across millennia by its own inhabitants (Sapta Sindhava, Bharatavarsha, Jambudvipa) and by foreign visitors (Hind, Indoi, Yindu, Tianzhu), culminating in Article 1 of the Constitution.
What Class 6 Social Science Chapter 5 Covers
How Indians Named India traces the Rigvedic Sapta Sindhava (‘land of the seven rivers’), the Mahabharata’s Bharatavarsha and Jambudvipa, Emperor Ashoka’s rock edicts (~250 BCE) using Jambudvipa for the whole subcontinent, the Vishnu Purana’s geographic definition of Bharata, and ancient Tamil literature calling Cape Comorin to the northern mountains Navalam Tivu.
How Foreigners Named India shows how 6th-century BCE Persians adapted Sindhu into Hind / Hidu / Hindu, ancient Greeks dropped the ‘h’ to form Indoi / Indike (Latin India), and Chinese scholars like Xuanzang wrote Yindu / Indu and Tianzhu (‘heavenly master’, honouring the land of the Buddha).
Exercises in Chapter 5
- Before we move on … chapter summary points and Questions, activities and projects.
- LET’S EXPLORE and THINK ABOUT IT classroom inquiry tasks.
Read Class 6 Social Science Chapter 5 Online
More Chapters
- Previous: Chapter 4: Timeline and Sources of History
- Next: Chapter 6: The Beginnings of Indian Civilisation
- Hindi medium: Class 6 Social Science Chapter 5 PDF in Hindi (Samaj ka Adhyayan)
- All Social Science chapters and the other Class 6 books: Class 6 NCERT books 2026-27
- All Class 1 to 12 NCERT Textbooks: NCERT Books PDF (Class 1–12)
FAQ
How does the Vishnu Purana define the geography of Bharata?
It states: ‘The country that lies north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains (Himalayas) is called Bharata.’
How did the name ‘India’ originate from the Sanskrit word ‘Sindhu’?
Ancient Persians pronounced the Sanskrit ‘Sindhu’ (the Indus River region) as ‘Hind’ or ‘Hindu’, and the ancient Greeks adapted this into ‘Indoi’ or ‘Indike’ (dropping the initial ‘h’), which entered Latin and English as ‘India’.