A European Informational Website
learn more
South Asia, also known as Southern Asia, is a southern geopolitical region of the Asian continent comprising territories on and in proximity to the Indian subcontinent. It is surrounded by (from west to east) Western Asia, Central Asia, Eastern Asia, and Southeastern Asia.
South Asia consists of the following countries and territories, these countries are also active members of SAARC (except British Indian Ocean Territory):
The U.N. further includes Afghanistan and Iran as part of Southern Asia:[1]
Also sometimes included (for assumed cultural reasons):
The term Indian subcontinent aptly describe those regions which geophysically lie on the Indian Plate, bordered on the north by the Eurasian Plate. Geopolitically, however, South Asia or Southern Asia subsumes the Indian subcontinent: it also includes territories found external to the Indian Plate and in proximity to it. Afghanistan, for instance, is sometimes grouped in this region due to sociopolitical and ethnic (Pashtun) ties to neighbouring Pakistan, whilst Pakistani regions west of the Indus are sometimes described as being in Central Asia, due to historical connections. A good proportion of the Baluchistan land mass is not on the Indian plate, but on the fringes of the Iranian plateau. As in the case of the Hindukush mountains everything to the south-east of Iranian Plateau is considered South Asia.
The peoples of the region possess several distinguishing features that set them apart anthropologically from the rest of Asia; the dominant peoples and cultures are Indo-Aryan and Dravidian, and have a great affinity with the Iranian Plateau and the Caucasus. Persian, Arab and Turkish cultural traditions from the west also form an integral part of Islamic South Asian culture, but have been radically adapted to form a Muslim culture distinct from what is found in the Middle East e.g. pilgrimage to dargahs.
South Asia ranks among the world's most densely-populated regions. About 1.6 billion people live here – about one-fourth of all the people in the world. The region's population density of 305 persons per square kilometre is more than seven times the world average.
The region has a long history. Ancient civilizations developed in the Dwaraka region and the Indus River Valley. The region was at its most prosperous before the 18th century, when the Mughal Empire held sway in the north; European colonialism led to its expansion in the region, by Portugal and Holland, and later Britain and to a lesser degree France. Most of the region gained independence from Europe by the late 1940s.
(L)âm-a