New Delhi: In the 1800s, after Tipu Sultan fell in Mysore, the British wanted to rule over S outh India. And they set out to do so with their age-old imperial trick: divide and conquer . Except, the division was mathematical —they split the land into several triangles to measure it using the basics of trigonometry.

T he colonial rulers wanted to understand the length and breadth of the Indian peninsula . They longed for an accurate map.

During the triangulation survey , Lieutenant-Colonel William Lambton , a geographer, meticulously measured the length, breadth, height, and dip of the peninsula with his team for more than 20 years. Show Full Article

Lambton, who worked on the survey for 25 years , had no

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