The Harappan Civilization was situated by the Indus River that flowed through Northwest India and Eastern Pakistan. Its remains were discovered in 1920, until which time it was dismissed off as quite insignificant. Back then there was also the Ancient Egyptian Civilization and the Mesopotamian Civilization. However, its discovery brought it in the same league as the above two and gave it the respect it deserved.
The Harappan Civilization existed around 2600 BC to 2000 – 1500 BC. A popular civilization, it greatly influenced the Hindu culture. The sites of the civilization were discovered in Sind, Baluchistan, Makran, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Kutch, Kathiwad and Badakshan in today’s India, Pakistan and Afganistan.
The Harappan civilization was the Bronze Age Civilization that existed between 3300 to 1300 BCE. You can read the article here that gives its detailed history.
A planned township:
The Harappan civilization was a planned civilization, the details of which could give contemporaries societies of the world a lesson or two on planning and implementation.
A municipal governing body gave sufficient importance to every little issue. With an eye for detail, the planners of this civilization gave a lot of importance to its drainage system. Its houses made of baked bricks, the streets, the drainage and sewage system, as well as the canals built for distribution of water for land and agriculture—each one of these speaks of a planning that was highly advanced in nature.
Building of the city was based on the geographical as well as the climatic factors. Moreover, agriculture being an important occupation, enough attention was given to building reservoirs as also water tanks for homes.