India dwarfs South America: about 3,155,807 km² km² against 17,840,000 km² km². At true size India is about 5.7× larger — the whole of South America fits into India roughly 5 times.
The old Mercator map treated both about equally (1.2× vs 1× inflation), so at least their relative sizes were preserved — even if both were drawn at the wrong absolute scale.
India fits 5× into South America.