History
Indus Valley Civilisation
Sites and Town Planning
Indus Valley Civilisation for CGPSC: discovery, phases, extent, major sites with rivers and excavators, and Harappan town planning, drains and the Great Bath.
Prerequisites
- Prehistoric Sites and Rock Art of Chhattisgarh: the Stone Age background against which the first cities appear
- Basic map sense of the north-west: the Indus and its five Punjab tributaries, the Ghaggar-Hakra, Sindh, Gujarat and the Rann of Kutch (see Drainage)
The Hook: A Planned City, 4,500 Years Before Nava Raipur
Connect
Nava Raipur Atal Nagar was planned on paper before a single building went up: sectors, straight roads meeting at right angles, a separate government complex, and underground drainage. Every monsoon, older parts of Raipur and Bilaspur show what happens without such planning: waterlogged lanes and overflowing open drains.
Around 2600 BCE, people in the Indus basin were already building cities with straight streets, standardised bricks, covered drains and a raised administrative quarter. Nobody has found a palace or a royal tomb, yet the planning is so uniform from Sindh to Gujarat that it implies some authority enforced it.
Where were these cities, who found them, and what exactly made their planning special?
Why it matters: Prelims asks site-river-state matching, “which site is associated with …” and “first / largest / only” questions almost every year. Mains asks you to describe the features of Harappan urban planning or to assess the civilisation’s significance.
Discovery: How the Civilisation Was Found
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1826 (published 1842) | Charles Masson described the mounds at Harappa |
| 1850s–1870s | Alexander Cunningham, first Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), visited Harappa and published a seal from it in 1875, without recognising its age |
| 1921 | Daya Ram Sahni began excavating Harappa (हड़प्पा) under ASI Director-General John Marshall (the work began in the 1920–21 season) |
| 1922 | R.D. Banerji began work at Mohenjo-daro (मोहनजोदड़ो) |
| 20 September 1924 | Marshall announced the discovery of a “long-forgotten civilisation” in the Illustrated London News |
Why three names?
- Indus Valley Civilisation (सिंधु घाटी सभ्यता): the first sites were in the Indus basin.
- Harappan Civilisation (हड़प्पा सभ्यता): archaeologists name a culture after the first site discovered, and Harappa was excavated first. This is the preferred term in NCERT.
- Sindhu-Sarasvati Civilisation: used by some scholars because many sites lie along the Ghaggar-Hakra, which they identify with the Vedic Sarasvati. The identification is debated.
Phases and Extent
Archaeologists divide the tradition into three broad phases (dates are approximate and vary slightly between authors):
| Phase | Approximate dates | Character |
|---|---|---|
| Early Harappan | c. 3300 (some authors 3500)–2600 BCE | Villages and towns; regional cultures such as Kot Diji, Amri, Hakra |
| Mature Harappan | c. 2600–1900 BCE | The urban phase: cities, seals, script, standard weights and bricks |
| Late Harappan | c. 1900–1300 BCE | De-urbanisation; cities shrink, script and seals fade, regional cultures return |
The Neolithic site of Mehrgarh (मेहरगढ़), near the Bolan Pass in Balochistan, excavated by Jean-François Jarrige from 1974, shows farming and herding from about 7000 BCE. It is a precursor, not a Harappan city.
Extent: The civilisation covered an area usually estimated at about 1.3 million sq km, larger than ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia put together. Surveys have listed more than 1,000 Mature Harappan sites (one widely cited compilation counts 1,022, of which 616 are in India and 406 in Pakistan). Most of them are small villages. Only a handful were cities.
The Four Extremities
| Direction | Site | River / location | Present-day region |
|---|---|---|---|
| North | Manda | Chenab | Jammu (J&K) |
| South | Daimabad | Pravara (Godavari basin) | Ahmednagar (now Ahilyanagar) district, Maharashtra |
| East | Alamgirpur | Hindon (Yamuna basin) | Meerut district, Uttar Pradesh |
| West | Sutkagendor | Dasht | Makran coast, Balochistan (Pakistan) |
Shortughai in north-eastern Afghanistan, near the Amu Darya (Oxus), is a Harappan trading outpost, usually treated separately from the main zone. See Economy and Trade.
Major Sites: The Prelims Table
| Site | River / setting | Present location | Excavator (first major work) | Remember it for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Harappa | Ravi | Sahiwal (old Montgomery) district, Punjab, Pakistan | Daya Ram Sahni, 1921 | First site excavated; “granary” of two rows of six units near the river; working platforms; Cemetery R-37 and the later Cemetery H |
| Mohenjo-daro (“mound of the dead”) | Indus | Larkana district, Sindh, Pakistan | R.D. Banerji, 1922 | Great Bath; large “granary”/hall; “Priest-King” bust; bronze Dancing Girl; Pashupati seal; woven cotton fragment; about 700 wells. UNESCO World Heritage Site (1980) |
| Chanhudaro | Indus | Sindh, Pakistan | N.G. Majumdar, 1931; Ernest Mackay, 1935 | Only city without a citadel; bead-making workshop with a furnace; a craft-production centre |
| Kot Diji | Indus | Sindh, Pakistan | F.A. Khan, 1955 | Early Harappan settlement with fortification |
| Amri | Indus | Sindh, Pakistan | N.G. Majumdar, 1929 | Early Harappan to Mature Harappan sequence |
| Kalibangan (“black bangles”) | Ghaggar | Hanumangarh district, Rajasthan | Identified as Harappan by A. Ghosh (1950s); excavated by B.B. Lal and B.K. Thapar, 1960–69 | Ploughed field (Early Harappan level); fire altars; mud-brick (not burnt-brick) buildings; both citadel and lower town walled |
| Lothal | Bhogava (near the Sabarmati, Gulf of Khambhat) | Ahmedabad district, Gujarat | S.R. Rao: found 1954, excavated 1955–60 | Dockyard (as interpreted by Rao); bead-making; rice husk; fire altars; a Persian Gulf type seal; double burials |
| Dholavira | Between the Mansar and Manhar seasonal streams, on Khadir Bet island, Rann of Kutch | Kutch district, Gujarat | Found by J.P. Joshi, 1967–68; excavated by R.S. Bisht, 1990–2005 | Three-part city; rock-cut water reservoirs; signboard of ten large signs; open ceremonial ground. UNESCO World Heritage Site, 27 July 2021 (India’s 40th) |
| Rakhigarhi | Ghaggar–Chautang (Drishadvati) basin | Hisar district, Haryana | Excavated by ASI from the late 1990s; later by Vasant Shinde (Deccan College) | Generally described as the largest Harappan site in India; ancient DNA study published 2019 |
| Banawali | Ghaggar basin | Fatehabad district, Haryana | R.S. Bisht, from the 1970s | Terracotta plough model; barley; streets not in a strict grid |
| Surkotada | Kutch | Gujarat | J.P. Joshi, 1964 | Fortified settlement; bones claimed as horse (identification debated) |
| Ropar (Rupnagar) | Sutlej | Punjab (India) | Y.D. Sharma, 1950s | Often cited as the first Harappan site excavated after Independence; a dog buried with a human |
| Alamgirpur | Hindon | Meerut, Uttar Pradesh | Y.D. Sharma, 1958 | Easternmost site |
| Daimabad | Pravara | Maharashtra | 1950s onwards | Southernmost; a bronze hoard (chariot with rider, elephant, rhinoceros, buffalo), whose Harappan affiliation is debated |
| Sutkagendor | Dasht | Balochistan, Pakistan | Aurel Stein (1927); George Dales (1962) | Westernmost; coastal trade post |
| Shortughai | Near the Amu Darya | Afghanistan | French team (H.-P. Francfort), 1970s | Trading outpost for lapis lazuli; traces of irrigation canals |
Site to state: the five India-wise clusters
- Gujarat: Lothal, Dholavira, Surkotada, Rangpur, Rojdi, Desalpur, Kuntasi
- Rajasthan: Kalibangan (Ganeshwar near Khetri is a related copper-working culture, not a Harappan city)
- Haryana: Rakhigarhi, Banawali, Bhirrana, Kunal, Mitathal
- Punjab: Ropar (Rupnagar), Sanghol
- Uttar Pradesh: Alamgirpur, Hulas; J&K: Manda; Maharashtra: Daimabad
Pakistan: Harappa (Punjab); Mohenjo-daro, Chanhudaro, Kot Diji, Amri (Sindh); Sutkagendor, Mehrgarh (Balochistan).
Town Planning (नगर नियोजन): The Core Features
1. Two-part (sometimes three-part) layout
- Most cities had a smaller, higher citadel (दुर्ग) on the west, and a larger, lower lower town on the east.
- The citadel stood on mud-brick platforms, and held the large public structures (the Great Bath and the “granary” at Mohenjo-daro).
- The lower town was also built on platforms. Laying these foundations before building shows planning in advance and a large labour force.
- Dholavira is the exception that examiners love: it had three parts (citadel, middle town and lower town), with walled enclosures and a large open ground.
- Chanhudaro had no citadel at all.
2. Streets and blocks
- Main streets ran roughly north–south and east–west, crossing at right angles, dividing the town into rectangular blocks. This is called the grid (chessboard) pattern.
- Streets were laid out first and houses built along them.
- Banawali is the known deviation: its streets do not follow a strict grid.
3. Bricks
- Burnt (baked) bricks were used widely in the Indus cities, and sun-dried mud bricks at sites such as Kalibangan.
- Brick sizes followed a standard ratio of 1 : 2 : 4 (thickness : width : length) across sites, whether burnt or sun-dried. Such uniformity across hundreds of kilometres is itself evidence of shared standards.
- No stone buildings on any scale, and no iron at all. The civilisation belongs to the Bronze Age.
4. Drainage: the most admired feature
- Every house was connected to street drains. Drains were laid with bricks and often covered with bricks or stone slabs.
- Drains had a gentle slope; larger ones had inspection openings and cesspits to collect waste, which suggests regular cleaning.
- NCERT notes that drains appear even in smaller settlements such as Lothal, where houses used mud bricks while drains used burnt bricks.
5. Houses
- Houses were built around a central courtyard, which was the centre of cooking and weaving.
- There were no windows on the ground floor facing the main street, and main entrances opened onto side lanes, so the interior could not be seen. This points to a concern for privacy.
- Many houses had a bathroom paved with bricks, with drains through the wall to the street. Some had staircases to an upper storey or roof.
- Many houses had their own wells. Mohenjo-daro had about 700 wells in all.
6. Large public structures
| Structure | Where | Facts | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Great Bath (विशाल स्नानागार) | Citadel, Mohenjo-daro | Rectangular tank about 12 m × 7 m, about 2.4 m deep; steps on the north and south; floor of bricks set on edge in gypsum mortar; a layer of bitumen (natural tar) for waterproofing; fed by a well, emptied by a large drain; surrounded by a corridor and rooms | Most scholars suggest ritual bathing, which links to the later Indian importance of sacred bathing. Function is inferred, not recorded |
| “Great Granary” | Citadel, Mohenjo-daro | The largest building at Mohenjo-daro; a brick base with air ducts | Wheeler called it a granary. Many archaeologists doubt this (no grain remains) and call it a “great hall” |
| “Granary” | Harappa, near the Ravi | Two rows of six units on a raised platform; circular working platforms nearby | Function again inferred |
| Assembly hall | Mohenjo-daro | A large pillared hall | Possibly a meeting place |
| Dockyard | Lothal | A large brick-lined basin connected by a channel to the river | S.R. Rao read it as a dockyard. Some scholars argue it was a water reservoir |
| Reservoirs | Dholavira | A chain of large rock-cut water reservoirs and channels storing seasonal rain water | Water management in an arid zone, praised by UNESCO |
| Fire altars | Kalibangan, Lothal | Rows of pits with ash and animal bone | Ritual use (see Religion and Script) |
What is missing is also evidence
No palace, no royal tomb and no building that can be confidently called a temple has been found. Yet bricks, weights, seals and street plans are standard across the whole zone. Historians therefore debate who ruled: a single state, several city-states, a class of merchants or a priestly elite. This is a favourite Mains angle: uniformity without visible kings.
Evaluation for Mains: why the planning matters
- Civic sense: drainage, private bathrooms and wells show attention to public health that was not matched in many later Indian towns.
- Social organisation: platforms, walls and standard bricks need mobilised labour and planning authority.
- Social differentiation: the citadel versus lower town, and house sizes that vary from large courtyard houses to single-room quarters, suggest an unequal society.
- Adaptation to environment: Dholavira’s reservoirs in the arid Rann, and platforms against floods on the Indus.
- Limits: the grid is not perfectly uniform (Banawali), and the interpretation of “granaries” and “docks” rests on archaeologists’ readings, not texts.
Memory Tricks
The four corners: 'Man Dai Alam Sut'
Manda (North) · Daimabad (South) · Alamgirpur (East) · Sutkagendor (West).
Read it like a sentence: “Man from the Dairy saw the Alam (world) in a Sut (thread)”. North → South → East → West.
Rivers of the big five
“Ravi gave Harappa, Indus gave Mohenjo, Ghaggar gave Kali, Bhogava gave Lothal, the Rann gave Dholavira.”
Harappa–Ravi, Mohenjo-daro–Indus, Kalibangan–Ghaggar, Lothal–Bhogava, Dholavira–Mansar/Manhar streams in the Rann.
Excavators in time order: 'Sahni, Banerji, Rao, Lal, Bisht'
Harappa → Sahni (1921) · Mohenjo-daro → Banerji (1922) · Lothal → Rao (1955) · Kalibangan → Lal and Thapar (1960s) · Dholavira → Bisht (1990).
The list runs in the order the excavations began, so it doubles as a timeline: two pre-Independence cities in Pakistan, then three post-Independence sites in India.
Don’t Confuse
| This | vs | That |
|---|---|---|
| Harappa — first excavated (1921), on the Ravi, Punjab (Pakistan) | vs | Mohenjo-daro — 1922, on the Indus, Sindh; the Great Bath |
| Chanhudaro — no citadel, Sindh | vs | Dholavira — three divisions, Gujarat |
| Kalibangan — ploughed field, fire altars, mud bricks, Rajasthan | vs | Banawali — terracotta model of a plough, Haryana |
| Lothal — dockyard, Ahmedabad district | vs | Dholavira — reservoirs and signboard, Kutch |
| Rakhigarhi — largest site in India | vs | Mohenjo-daro — the best-known large city overall (Pakistan) |
| Mehrgarh — Neolithic, c. 7000 BCE, precursor | vs | Mature Harappan — c. 2600–1900 BCE, urban phase |
| Mohenjo-daro — UNESCO site in Pakistan (1980) | vs | Dholavira — UNESCO site in India (2021) |
Common Mistakes
MCQ traps on sites
- “Mohenjo-daro was the first Harappan site excavated.” No. Harappa (1921) came first, which is why the culture is named after it.
- “Kalibangan had a terracotta plough.” No. Kalibangan has an actual ploughed field. The terracotta plough model is from Banawali (and sites in Cholistan).
- “Lothal is on the Sabarmati.” Lothal is on the Bhogava, near where it meets the Sabarmati, close to the Gulf of Khambhat.
- “All Harappan buildings used burnt bricks.” Kalibangan used mostly mud bricks. The standard ratio (1:2:4) applied to both kinds.
- “Mehrgarh is a Harappan city.” It is a Neolithic village site that came thousands of years earlier.
- “Dholavira is in Rajasthan” / “on an island in the Gulf of Khambhat.” It is on Khadir Bet in the Rann of Kutch, Gujarat.
Practice
All questions below are original practice questions written in CGPSC style. They are not previous-year questions.
Level 1: Foundation
- The first Harappan site to be excavated was ______, by ______ in 1921.
- The only Harappan city without a citadel is ______.
- Dholavira was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in ______ as India’s ______ World Heritage Site.
Answers
- Harappa, by Daya Ram Sahni.
- Chanhudaro.
- 2021 (27 July); India’s 40th World Heritage Site.
Level 2: Prelims MCQs
Q1. Match List I (Harappan site) with List II (River / setting):
| List I | List II |
|---|---|
| A. Harappa | 1. Bhogava |
| B. Kalibangan | 2. Ravi |
| C. Lothal | 3. Ghaggar |
| D. Ropar | 4. Sutlej |
- (a) A-2, B-3, C-1, D-4
- (b) A-2, B-1, C-3, D-4
- (c) A-4, B-3, C-1, D-2
- (d) A-3, B-2, C-4, D-1
Answer and explanation
(a) A-2, B-3, C-1, D-4. Harappa lies on the Ravi in Pakistani Punjab. Kalibangan is on the Ghaggar in Hanumangarh district of Rajasthan. Lothal is on the Bhogava in Ahmedabad district of Gujarat. Ropar (Rupnagar) is on the Sutlej in Indian Punjab.
Q2. Consider the following statements about Dholavira:
- It is located in the Kutch district of Gujarat.
- It was divided into a citadel, a middle town and a lower town.
- It was the first Harappan site in India to be excavated after Independence.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a) 1 only
- (b) 1 and 2 only
- (c) 2 and 3 only
- (d) 1, 2 and 3
Answer and explanation
(b) 1 and 2 only. Dholavira is on Khadir Bet in the Rann of Kutch and is known for its three-part layout, reservoirs and signboard. Statement 3 is wrong: Dholavira was found in 1967–68 and excavated mainly from 1990. Ropar is the site usually cited as the first excavated after Independence (1950s).
Q3. Which one of the following is the southernmost Harappan site?
- (a) Lothal
- (b) Daimabad
- (c) Surkotada
- (d) Rangpur
Answer and explanation
(b) Daimabad, on the Pravara in Maharashtra. Lothal, Surkotada and Rangpur are all in Gujarat, north of Daimabad.
Q4. With reference to Harappan town planning, which of the following statements is not correct?
- (a) Main entrances of houses usually opened onto side lanes rather than main streets.
- (b) Bricks of a standard ratio were used at widely separated sites.
- (c) The citadel was generally located on the eastern side of the city.
- (d) Street drains were often covered with bricks or stone slabs.
Answer and explanation
(c) is not correct. The citadel was generally on the west and the larger lower town on the east. The other three statements describe genuine features: privacy-conscious doorways, the 1:2:4 brick ratio, and covered drains.
Q5. The Great Bath of Mohenjo-daro was made watertight mainly by using
- (a) lime plaster and terracotta tiles
- (b) bricks set in gypsum mortar with a layer of bitumen
- (c) stone slabs joined with copper clamps
- (d) fired clay pipes embedded in mud
Answer and explanation
(b). The floor and walls used fine bricks set on edge in gypsum mortar, and a layer of bitumen (natural tar) sealed the tank. Stone construction and copper clamps were not used.
Level 3: Mains Answer Writing
Q1. (150–200 words) “The town planning of the Harappan cities reflects a highly organised society.” Discuss.
Model answer outline
- Intro: The Mature Harappan phase (c. 2600–1900 BCE) produced cities such as Mohenjo-daro, Harappa, Kalibangan, Lothal and Dholavira, with a remarkably uniform plan across about 1.3 million sq km.
- Body:
- Layout: a raised western citadel and an eastern lower town; Dholavira’s three parts; streets crossing at right angles.
- Standardisation: bricks in a 1:2:4 ratio, standard weights; this implies shared rules across distant sites.
- Public health: covered drains, house bathrooms, cesspits and about 700 wells at Mohenjo-daro.
- Public works: the Great Bath, the large “granary”/hall, Lothal’s basin, Dholavira’s reservoirs; platforms built before houses show mobilised labour.
- Social structure: variation in house size and the separate citadel show hierarchy.
- Caution: no palace or royal records, so the nature of authority is debated; functions of “granaries” and “docks” are interpretations.
- Conclusion: Even without known kings, the cities show planning, civic discipline and coordination that make the Harappans the first urbanisation of the subcontinent.
Q2. (60 words) Why is Dholavira considered unique among Harappan sites?
Model answer outline
- Located on Khadir Bet in the Rann of Kutch (Gujarat); found by J.P. Joshi (1967–68), excavated by R.S. Bisht (1990–2005).
- Three-part city (citadel, middle town, lower town) instead of the usual two.
- Rock-cut reservoirs for water harvesting in an arid zone; a signboard of ten large signs; a large open ground.
- UNESCO World Heritage Site since 27 July 2021.
Quick Revision Table
| Fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Harappa | Ravi; Sahiwal, Pakistani Punjab; Daya Ram Sahni, 1921 (first) |
| Mohenjo-daro | Indus; Larkana, Sindh; R.D. Banerji, 1922; Great Bath; UNESCO 1980 |
| Announcement | John Marshall, Illustrated London News, 20 Sep 1924 |
| Phases | Early c. 3300–2600; Mature c. 2600–1900; Late c. 1900–1300 BCE |
| Extent | About 1.3 million sq km; 1,000+ Mature Harappan sites |
| Extremities | Manda (N), Daimabad (S), Alamgirpur (E), Sutkagendor (W) |
| No citadel | Chanhudaro |
| Three divisions | Dholavira (UNESCO, 27 July 2021, India’s 40th) |
| Ploughed field / fire altars | Kalibangan (Ghaggar, Rajasthan) |
| Dockyard | Lothal (Bhogava, Gujarat; S.R. Rao) |
| Largest in India | Rakhigarhi (Hisar, Haryana) |
| Terracotta plough | Banawali (Haryana) |
| Brick ratio | 1 : 2 : 4 |
| Great Bath | About 12 × 7 m, 2.4 m deep; gypsum mortar + bitumen |
Key Takeaways
Key Takeaways
- Harappa (1921) came before Mohenjo-daro (1922); Marshall announced the civilisation in 1924.
- The Mature (urban) phase is c. 2600–1900 BCE, over about 1.3 million sq km.
- Learn every major site with its river, state and one signature find: that is how Prelims asks.
- Town planning = citadel and lower town, grid streets, 1:2:4 bricks, covered drains, courtyard houses, wells.
- Exceptions score marks: Chanhudaro (no citadel), Dholavira (three parts), Kalibangan (mud bricks), Banawali (no strict grid).
What’s Next
- Economy and Trade: what these cities grew, made and traded
- Religion and Script: seals, the Mother Goddess and the undeciphered script
- Indus Valley Civilisation — Quick Revision
- Art and Culture: Harappan art as the starting point of Indian art history
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