Consider the following statements relating to the use of the place-value system in India:
- 1.The earliest epigraphic use of the place-value system in India is found in the Mankani plates from Gujarat (AD 595–596).
- 2.In the ninth century, place-values become general in inscriptions all over India.
- 3.The place-values have been found in Sanskrit inscriptions in South-east Asia as early as the seventh century.
Which of the statements given above are correct?
Answer & explanation
Answer: (d) 1, 2 and 3
The decimal place-value notation was invented and first used in India. In inscriptions it appears first in a late sixth-century charter from Gujarat (AD 594-596 by different reckonings), is found in many dated Indian charters of the eighth and ninth centuries, and had reached South-east Asia by the late seventh century. All three statements are correct.
- ✓ 1. A copper-plate charter from Gujarat dated in the Chhedi (Kalachuri) year 346, that is AD 594-596, is the oldest dated Indian document to write a number in place-value form; the Mankani plates are the grant usually cited for it. Some historians doubt the date, but MacTutor judges it likely genuine.
- ✓ 2. Dated charters using place-value numbers run through the eighth and ninth centuries (AD 737, 753, 793, 815, 837), and the Gwalior inscription of AD 876, which also writes a zero, is the first undisputed one.
- ✓ 3. A Khmer inscription from Cambodia of about AD 680 (Sambor, the number 605 in the Saka era) already writes its number in place-value form with a zero, so place-value numerals were in use in South-east Asian inscriptions in the seventh century.
Remember · Place-value epigraphy: Gujarat charter, AD 594-596 (Chhedi year 346) earliest; charters through the 8th-9th centuries, Gwalior AD 876 undisputed; South-east Asia by about AD 680 (Sambor, Cambodia).
📘 Read it in NCERT: Class 11 Knowledge Traditions and Practices of India, Part I, Ch 6 (practise this chapter)
Sources
- NCERT Class 11 · Knowledge Traditions and Practices of India, Part I, Chapter 6 “it is now generally admitted that the decimal place value system of numeral notation was invented and first used by the Indians.”
- MacTutor History of Mathematics (University of St Andrews), Indian numerals ↗ · reference work “The first inscription which is dated and is not disputed is the inscription at Gwalior dated 933 in the Vikrama calendar which translates to a date in our calendar of 876 AD. … The oldest dated Indian document which contains a number written in the place-value form used today is a legal document dated 346 in the Chhedi calendar which translates to a date in our calendar of 594 AD.”
- MacTutor History of Mathematics (University of St Andrews), Indian Mathematics: Redressing the balance, Decimal numeration and the place-value system ↗ · reference work “The first recorded 'non-mathematical' use of zero dates even later, around 680 AD, the number 605 was found on a Khmer inscription in Cambodia.”
Question and answer: UPSC's provisional GS Paper I (2026, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify). ·