Arunachal Pradesh is one of the 29 states of India and is the northeastern-most state of the country. Arunachal Pradesh borders the states of Assam and Nagaland to the south and shares international borders with Bhutan in the west, Myanmar in the east and is separated from China in the north by the McMahon Line.
Itanagar is the capital of the state. A major part of the state is claimed by the People's Republic of China, who refers to it as "South Tibet". During the 1962 Sino-Indian war, Chinese forces temporarily crossed the McMahon line, the border line between the state and China.
Land of the Dawn-Lit Mountains is the sobriquet for the state in Sanskrit;it is also known as the Orchid State of India or the Paradise of the Botanists. Geographically, it is the largest of the Seven Sister States of Northeast India.
History its population are descendants of the great AboTani whose origin is unknown but is said to be the first man of the five tribes, namely Tagin, Nyishi, Adi, Galo and Apatani which have a population of over one and half million.
The major parts of the history of the Tani people will be found in the ancient libraries of Tibet as from earliest times the Tani people traded with Tibetans for swords and other metals in exchange for meat and wool.
Tibetans referred to the Tani people as the Lhobhas - lho means south and bha means people. Recorded history only became available in the Chutiya chronicles. The Monpa and Sherdukpen do keep historical records of the existence of local chiefdoms in the northwest as well.
Northwestern parts of this area came under the control of the Monpa kingdom of Monyul, which flourished. The remaining parts of the state, especially those bordering Myanmar, were under the control of the Chutiya Kings.
However, most Arunachali tribes remained in practice largely autonomous up until Indian independence and the formalisation of indigenous administration in 1947. Recent excavations of ruins of Hindu temples, such as the 14th century Malinithan at the foot of the Siang hills in West Siang, indicate they were built during the Chutiya reign.
Another notable heritage site, Bhismaknagar, has led to suggestions that the Chutiya people had an advanced culture and administration in prehistoric times. The third heritage site, the 400-year-old Tawang Monastery in the extreme north-west of the state, provides some historical evidence of the Buddhist tribal people. The sixth Dalai Lama Tsangyang Gyatso was born in Tawang.
