One winter in the early 18th century, it was so cold animals died in their barns, travellers froze to death, and even the Mediterranean iced over. It was Europe's coldest spell for the past 500 years.

The peasantry in the Deccan suffered from widespread indebtedness during the 19th century. In March 1881, after touring the rural areas of Poona and Ahmadnagar districts, which were still recovering from the devastations caused by famine and the credit crunch followed by the peasant revolt of 1876-79, Mahadev Govind Ranade proposed the establishment of agricultural-shetkari banks.

The opium trade yielded enormous profits to the British imperialists during the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century.

The problem of water availability was a pivotal facet of daily life, particularly in urban areas, where it had to be made perennially obtainable in large quantities. Thus, apart from river water, artificial water reservoirs of massive proportions, and also step wells were constructed on a great scale in most parts of the country.

The physical formatting of a city is done not by accident but by definite purposes and logic that its dominant groups intend to transcribe in space. The Portuguese, who developed Goa as their seat in Asia, transferred a large set of meanings of power into its urban space by resorting to architectural process as a language of domination.

Pandit Kalhan's 12th century text, the 'Rajatarangini' (composed around 1148-1150 AD), which chronicles the history of Kashmir, describes a well conceived and maintained irrigation system. One of the most notable names recorded in the 'Rajatarangini' is Suyya. He is credited with "draining the water of the Vitasta River and controlling it by constructing a stone dam, and clearing its bed."

Geological records point out to a period of aridity 10,000 years ago, at the end stage of Pleistocene glaciation, which gradually changed to a wet phase. Copious rainfall in the Himalayan region gave rise to innumerable rivers, mainly Saraswati river along with six other rivers which flowed down in cascades bringing enormous amounts of water in the plains of Punjab, Rajasthan and north Gujarat.