South Asia, home to one of the world’s earliest known civilizations, is currently one of the most densely populated regions on the planet. Despite a history of ethno-linguistic diversity and political fragmentation, the people of this region are nonetheless unified by a common cultural and ethical outlook. It has been the wealth of ancient textual literature in Sanskrit, Prākrit, and other regional languages that has served as a major unifying factor. The idealistic semblance in music and dance, art and architecture, and ways of life has outshone the deep-rooted political divisions persisting for centuries. Of much significance is the description by Mohammad-Arif Aminah, a scholar on South Asian studies, that none of India’s South Asian neighbours can interact with one another without crossing Indian territory, thanks to the central and asymmetrical presence of India in various domains, including geography, which tends to be perceived as ‘Delhi-centric’. For all the tremendous socio-cultural diversity within each country of the sub-continent, the people of the region share common social, cultural, linguistic, and religious practices across national boundaries (Mohammad-Arif 2014). Further, alongside its location at the northern centre of the Indian Ocean, India accounts more than 75 per cent of the geographical area and population of South Asia. Implicitly, much of the discussion of this chapter on South Asia centres on India.