Short answers, pulled from the story.
George Harrison studied under Ravi Shankar on a houseboat on Dal Lake in Srinagar, Kashmir during the autumn of 1966. He traveled there with his wife Pattie Boyd to receive personal tuition while absorbing religious texts like Paramahansa Yogananda's Autobiography of a Yogi.
The composition follows the pitches of Khamaj thaat which serves as the Indian equivalent of Mixolydian mode. The track features an exotic melody over a constant C-G root-fifth drone supported by tambura drone dilruba sitar tabla and Western string section.
The basic track was recorded on the 15th of March 1967 at EMI's Abbey Road studio 2 in London. Two additional overdubbing sessions took place on the 22nd of March and the 3rd of April before the completed recording was enhanced through automatic double tracking.
Contemporary reviews offered widely divergent opinions upon the song's release in May 1967 with Richard Goldstein calling the lyrics dismal despite finding the music remarkable. Other reviewers like Ian MacDonald viewed it as the conscience of Sgt Pepper while Tim Riley dismissed the track as directionless in 1988.
Big Jim Sullivan included the song on Sitar Beat first released in 1967 while Sonic Youth transformed the composition into rock complete with guitar feedback for NMEs multi-artist tribute Sgt Pepper Knew My Father in 1988. Oasis covered the track for BBC Radio 2 project celebrating 40th anniversary in 2007 and Flaming Lips recorded With a Little Help from My Fwends featuring Birdflower and Morgan Delt in 2014.