Short answers, pulled from the story.
Anatomically modern humans are estimated to have first arrived on the Indian subcontinent between 73,000 and 55,000 years ago, likely coming by way of the coast. The earliest known human remains in South Asia date to about 30,000 years ago.
The Indus Valley Civilisation was one of three early cradles of civilisation in the Old World and the most expansive of them. Its mature phase flourished from about 2600 to 1900 BCE, centred mostly in modern-day Pakistan, with brick cities such as Harappa and Mohenjo-daro and a population that may have reached five million.
Ashoka was the Mauryan king whose campaign against the Kalingans around 260 BCE caused immense loss of life, leading him to shun violence and embrace Buddhism. He sponsored Buddhist missions across the Indo-Mediterranean, Sri Lanka, Southeast Asia, West Asia, North Africa, and Mediterranean Europe, and ruled until his death around 232 BCE.
The Gupta Empire of the 4th to 6th centuries CE is called the Golden Age of India for its cultural creativity in literature, architecture, sculpture, and painting. It produced scholars including Kalidasa and Aryabhata, and India's economy during this era is estimated to have been the largest in the world.
The Delhi Sultanate, founded by Central Asian Turks in the 12th and 13th centuries, produced an Indo-Muslim fusion of cultures and is credited with the likely birth of the Urdu language. It repelled the Mongol invasions during the rule of Alauddin Khalji, sparing India devastation visited on West and Central Asia.
The British Indian Empire was partitioned in August 1947 into the Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan, each gaining its independence. The independence movement after World War I was led by the Indian National Congress under Mahatma Gandhi.