Transportation From the Vedic Era till today in the Modern World

Transportation is the movement of humans, livestock, and goods from one geographical location to another. It is one of the most basic human needs which exists since the dawn of humankind. 

There are three modes of transportation: 

1. Land Transport

2. Water Transport 

3. Air Transport 

Transportation plays a pivotal role in the development of civilisation, and we had witnessed many changes right from the starting when we were using animals to now fossil fuels being utilised in running modern vehicles. This growth has helped us to make our world not just smaller in size but has also made movement faster and more convenient. Let’s see how we started from ancient time to today’s fast transportation. Ancient to modern land transportation: In ancient India, transportation was difficult. 

Transportation started with a walk through jungles as we did not have proper roads back then. Sticks were used by common people for safety and support to move from one place to another. Apart from that, poor people also used bulls and donkeys for their transportation. Palkis were made for the ladies of the royal family, and Chariots were used to facilitate transportation of royal families and ministers. 
By the 5th century, we were upgrading ourselves towards a more advanced system like roads, bridges, crossways, and four-road junctions. After understanding the importance of land transportation, we used bullock carts, and animals like camels, oxen, elephants to move on land much more conveniently. Respective animals were being put to use in specific areas; for instance, camels were predominantly used in deserts of Rajasthan. As time passed, we became more civilised, and kingdoms came in to picture. India has seen many kingdoms ranging from the Mauryan Empire to Mughal era and also the British Era. 

Every kingdom developed new maps, and paved new roads solely to grow faster. Effective transportation also made its military strength and in turn the kingdom stronger. Under British rule, we showed a new revolution in mid-18th the century to the 19th century when special roads were made for transportation. Then came the time for fuel-driven vehicles, using oil, diesel and petrol. This development made our transportation easier and faster as compared to the last few generations. 
Owing to this, we made vehicles as per our need ranging from small vehicles like bikes, cars, buses, rickshaws, small trucks, too fast and heavy vehicles. Cars from the 19th century to the 21st-century Railway Transport: Main reason for faster growth in transportation in the last 200 years was because of the use of coal diesel. These things allowed us to grow faster as we were able to make vehicles which were useful for transportation. 

After the invention of cars, we witnessed a surge in trains, which helped us to transfer large numbers of people and goods. Trains played a crucial role in the growth of many countries, as it was capable of carrying a sheer amount of people and goods over a large distance, without compromising the safety. Things changed a lot after the invention of trains. It became an essential means of land transport for carrying heavy and bulky goods over long distances. 
Trains were the best option which made our work simpler as well as faster. We are using diesel and electric trains for our Railway transportation. Before that, we were using the steam locomotive in which we used coal, wood and oil to boil and generate power to run the train. 

Indian Railways: Indian Railways is now more than 160 years old. 1853 was the year when India showed the first train which ran from Mumbai to Thane. It is now the biggest network of over 8500 stations and more than 1,00,000km of a route. India Railways comes first among the world’s largest railway network, and it is the biggest job provider in the world, according to the sources. 

Indian railway has shortened the gap from one state to other in India and used transportation to facilitate business in India. Water Transport: India was the first country since ancient time to transport goods and people through the ocean, and we have many proofs for that right from Ramayana. India is gifted with many rivers, and major parts of the country are surrounded by the ocean right from the Himalayas to Kanyakumari. 
Water Transportation is the oldest and famous mode of transport in India. India has a 7617 km vast coastline, and there are 12 major ports and 187 minor/ intermediate ports. Nearly 95 per cent of the country’s foreign cargo moves by sea In the early Vedic period from 1500 to 900 BCE, boats were a famous way of transportation in water, and we described boats as dugouts. They mostly used these for inland transport. 

The limited material describing seafaring ships show that the early Aryans had little trade contacts with overseas civilisations. As time passed, India started switching from river to sea transport for facilitating their trade relations with Egypt and Mesopotamia. There is also evidence of the Indus valley civilisations having trade contacts with Mesopotamia and Egypt. Air Transport: Today most of the people think that aeroplanes are the most recent achievement of the modern scientific world. But the reality is entirely different. References show that Aryans of Vedic India had a good knowledge of aeronautics. 
Air transportation is the quickest and the most comfortable means of transportation. It is suitable for carrying precious goods, mail and high-class passengers. Air transport in India came into reality in 1911 when an aircraft carried mail from Allahabad to Naini across the river Ganga. In 1924, after World War-I British Imperial Airways started the first regular air service in India to provide a link with the UK. Tata Sons in 1932 were the first company who manage the first civil aviation company. The Government of India made up the International Airports Authority of India (IAAI) in 1972 to operate the nation’s international airports. 

They made up the National Airports Authority (NAA) in 1986 to look after domestic airports. Then we formed AAI in 1995. This new organisation was for creating, upgrading, maintaining and managing civil aviation infrastructure both on the ground and air space in the country According to sources and 2016 data, 486 total airports, airstrips, flying schools and military bases are available in India, 131 total operational airports (106 with scheduled commercial flights including some with a dual civilian and army use), and 34 international airports (6 airports serve domestic flights only). Words count: 1094