India is a continent

I beleive if one avoids going by the larger opinion and sticks to fundamentals, he / she would agree that India is not a country but a continent, just like Europe.

At its root, India is an amalgamation of states which represent uncorrelated centers of culture and language:

Maharashtra made for marathis speaking marathi, Bihar made for biharis speaking bihari, Tamil Nadu made for tamils speaking tamil . . . exactly like . . . Germany made for germans speaking german, France made for frenchmen speaking french, Spain for spaniards speaking spanish

Fortifying above fact is the fact that state boundaries are drawn to seggregate cultures from one another:

Countries cannot justify the existence of states like Goa, a tiny dot, with giants like Uttar Pradesh. Consider US - all states resemble more or less equal sized rectangles. Divisions to leverage simplicity in administration and not culture concentration.

Only continents (group of countries) can justify such disparate sizes. Luxemborg a country in Europe co-existing with larger countries like France.