1600
The East India Company is founded. The British company ruled much of India for the next 250 years.

1857
The Great Indian Mutiny or First War of Independence. Indians rebel against the British but the uprising is crushed. After this the British government takes over running India from the East India Company.

1911
British decide to move the capital from Calcutta to New Delhi, which happens twenty years later.

1947
At midnight on Aug. 15 India becomes an independent nation.

1947-1964
Jawaharlal Nehru is prime minister of India until his death.

1948
On Jan. 30 Mahatma Gandhi is assassinated by a Hindu fanatic. India and Pakistan go to war over Kashmir.

1962
China invades India. After a short war India loses territory in the northwestern state of Jammu and Kashmir.

1964
India's Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru dies.

1965
India and Pakistan again go to war over Kashmir.

1966
Jawaharlal Nehru's daughter, Indira Gandhi, becomes prime minister and leads India for most of the years until her death in 1984.

1971
India and Pakistan fight a third war. This time India fights to support separatists in East Pakistan. After the war East Pakistan becomes the independent nation of Bangladesh.

1972
Following the war India and Pakistan sign the Shimla Accord. The two sides agree to restore diplomatic relations and renounce using force to settle the dispute over Kashmir.

1975 - 1977
In the face of serious opposition and unrest, Indira Gandhi declares a state of emergency in India, giving her extensive powers to run the country unopposed.

1977
Indira Gandhi ends the state of emergency and is voted out of office, but she's re-elected prime minister in 1980.

1983
India beats the West Indies to win cricket's World Cup.

1984
In September, Indian soldiers attack Sikh separatists who are hiding in the holiest Sikh shrine, the Golden Temple in Amritsar.

A month later Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is assassinated by two of her Sikh bodyguards. More than 3,000 people are killed in the Hindu-Sikh riots that follow.

Indira's son, Rajiv, becomes prime minister of India.

The world's worst industrial disaster happens in Bhopal when an explosion at a Union Carbide plant spreads poisonous gas across the city. At least 2,000 people are killed immediately, hundreds of thousands are injured, and about 15,000 more have since died because of the accident.

1989
Separatist movement in Indian-administered Kashmir turns violent. Since then at least 40,000 people have been killed by militants and the Indian army.

1991
Rajiv Gandhi is killed in a suicide bomb attack by a supporter of the Sri Lankan separatist Tamil Tigers.

With the country on the verge of bankruptcy, the government introduces a wide range of free-market reforms to make it easier for Indians and foreigners to do business in India.

1992
In December, a Hindu mob tears down the Babri Mosque in the northern city of Ayodhya that Hindus say was built on the site of a former Hindu temple.

1992 - 1993
Following the destruction of the Babri Mosque, Hindu-Muslim riots across the country kill more than 2,000 people.

1996
The Congress party, which ruled India for most of the time since independence, is defeated in national elections by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

1998
India successfully tests nuclear weapons in the deserts of Rajasthan. Pakistan quickly conducts tests of its own and the simmering dispute between the South Asian rivals takes on the danger of escalating into a nuclear war.

1999
In February, the prime ministers of India and Pakistan sign the Lahore Declaration, in which both sides agree to work together to prevent conflict between the two nuclear powers.

In April, Pakistani troops cross the Line of Control in Kashmir and seize a small area near Kargil. After three months of fighting and at least 1,500 casualties, the Indian army pushes back the Pakistanis.

2000
India's population passes the one billion mark.

2001
India's prime minister and Pakistan's president meet at the northern Indian city of Agra. Talks at the Agra Summit collapse and the leaders fail to reach any significant agreements.

An earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale hits the western state of Gujarat and kills tens of thousands of people.

On Dec. 13 militants launch a suicide attack on the Indian parliament. New Delhi blames the attack on Pakistani-backed Kashmiri separatists and moves hundreds of thousands of soldiers to the Pakistani border. A tense standoff ensues that the international community fears could trigger the world's first nuclear war.

2002
In February, at least 56 Hindus are killed in a train car as they return from a visit to the disputed religious site at Ayodhya. More than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, are killed in the ensuing communal riots in Gujarat.

2003
In April, India's Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee offers a "hand of friendship" to Pakistan. This proves to be the beginning of a series of steps to normalize relations between New Delhi and Islamabad.

In July a bus route from Delhi to Lahore reopens. It's the first public transportation link between India and Pakistan since the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament.

2004
In May, Sonia Gandhi leads the Congress party and its allies to an election victory over the Hindu-nationalist BJP. Manmohan Singh becomes India's first non-Hindu prime minister.