India, Portuguese State of

The State of India (Portuguese: Estado da Índia), also referred as the Portuguese State of India (Estado Português da Índia, EPI) or simply Portuguese India (Índia Portuguesa), is a state of the Portuguese Overseas Empire, founded six years after the discovery of a sea route between Portugal and the Indian Subcontinent to serve as the governing body of a string of Portuguese fortresses and colonies overseas.The first viceroy, Francisco de Almeida, establishes his headquarters in Cochin (Cochim, Kochi).

Subsequent Portuguese governors were not always of viceroy rank.

After 1510, the capital of the Portuguese viceroyalty is transferred to Goa.

Until the eighteenth century, the Portuguese governor in Goa has authority over all Portuguese possessions in the Indian Ocean, from southern Africa to southeast Asia.

In 1752 Mozambique gets its own separate government and in 1844 the Portuguese Government of India stops administering the territory of Macau, Solor and Timor, and its authority is confined to the colonial holdings on the Malabar coast of present-day India.At the time of the British Indian Empire's dissolution in 1947, Portuguese India is subdivided into three districts located on modern-day India's western coast, sometimes referred to collectively as Goa: These are Goa; Daman (Portuguese: Damão) which includes the inland enclaves of Dadra and Nagar Haveli; and Diu.

Portugal loses effective control of the enclaves of Dadra and Nagar Haveli in 1954, and finally the rest of the overseas territory in December 1961, when it is taken by India after military action.

In spite of this, Portugal only recognizes Indian control in 1975, after the Carnation Revolution and the fall of the Estado Novo regime.