When it is stated about geographical regions of India, we can say that India is split into seven Geographical regions. They are
- The northern mountains consisting of the Himalayas and the northeast mountain tiers.
- Indo-Gangetic plains
- Thar Desert
- Central Highlands and Deccan Plateau
- East Coast
- West Coast
- Bordering seas and islands
Mountains
Map of the hilly areas in India.
A brilliant arc of mountains, composed of the Himalaya, Hindu Kush, and Patkai levels, define the Indian subcontinent. These mountains have been fashioned via the ongoing tectonic collision of the Indian Plate with the Eurasian Plate which started some 50 million years in the past. These mountain degrees are home to a number of the tallest mountains in the world and provide a herbal barrier against the cold polar winds. They additionally facilitate the monsoons that force climate in India. The safety and climatic manage they have furnished has been a geographical exceptional that has assisted India’s function as a Great electricity. The severa rivers that originate in those mountains provide water to the fertile Indo-Gangetic plains. These mountains are recognized by biogeographers because the boundary among two of the earth’s great ecozones; the temperate Palearctic that covers maximum of Eurasia, and the tropical and subtropical Indomalaya ecozone that includes the Indian subcontinent and enlarge into Southeast Asia and Indonesia. Historically, those levels have served as boundaries to invaders.
India has seven predominant mountain degrees having peaks of over 1,000 m (three,three hundred toes). The Himalayas are the best mountain stages to have snow-capped peaks. These degrees are:
- Aravalli
- Eastern Ghats
- Himalayas
- Patkai
- Vindhyas
- Sahyadri or Western Ghats
- Satpuras
- Karakoram
The Himalaya mountain range is the sector’s highest mountain variety. They shape India’s north-japanese border, setting apart it from the relaxation of Asia. The Himalayas are one of the world’s youngest mountain tiers, and increase nearly uninterrupted for a distance of two,500 km (1,550 miles), covering a place of 500,000 km² (193,000 rectangular miles).
Himalayan peaks in Sikkim.
The Himalayas make bigger from the kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir inside the west to the state of Arunachal Pradesh within the east. These states together with Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, and Sikkim lie in general inside the Himalayan area. Some of the Himalayan peaks variety over 7,000 m (23,000 toes) and the snow line levels between 6,000 m (19,six hundred feet) in Sikkim to round 3,000 m (nine,850 toes) in Kashmir. Kangchenjunga, which lies in Sikkim, is the very best point inside the usa’s territory (undisputed). Most peaks in the Himalayas remain snowbound at some point of the 12 months.
The Shiwalik, or decrease Himalaya, consists of smaller hills towards the Indian aspect. Most of the rock formations are young and noticeably volatile, with landslides being a normal phenomenon at some stage in the rainy season. Many of India’s hill stations are placed on this variety. The climate varies from sub tropical inside the foothills to tundra on the better elevations of these mountain levels.
The mountains on India’s jap border with Myanmar are called as the Patkai or the Purvanchal. They had been created by way of the identical tectonic strategies that resulted in the formation of the Himalaya. The capabilities of the Patkai stages are conical peaks, steep slopes and deep valleys. The Patkai degrees are not as rugged or tall as the Himalayas. There are 3 hill degrees that come under the Patkai: The Patkai-Bum, the Garo- Khasi- Jaintia, and the Lushai hills. The Garo-Khasi variety is within the Indian kingdom of Meghalaya. The weather ranges from temperate to alpine because of altitude. Cherrapunji, which lies at the windward aspect of those hills, has the distinction of being the wettest vicinity within the world, receiving the best annual rainfall.
The Vindhyas in significant India.
The Vindhya variety runs across most of crucial India, covering a distance of one,050 km (652 miles). The average elevation of these hills is 300 m (1,000 toes). They are believed to were shaped via the wastes created because of the weathering of the historic Aravalli mountains. It geographically separates northern India from southern India. The western cease of the range lies in jap Gujarat, near its border with the nation of Madhya Pradesh, and the range runs east and north almost to the Ganges River at Mirzapur.
The Satpura Range is a number hills in central India. It begins in japanese Gujarat close to the Arabian Sea coast, then runs east via Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and ends inside the kingdom of Chhattisgarh. It extends for a distance of 900 km with a lot of its peaks rising above a thousand m (three,300 toes). It is angular in form, with its vertex at Ratnapuri and the two sides being parallel to the Tapti and Narmada river. It runs parallel to the Vindhya Range, which lies to the north, and those east-west stages divide the Indo-Gangetic plain of northern India from the Deccan Plateau lying inside the south. The Narmada runs inside the melancholy between the Satpura and Vindhya levels, and drains the northern slope of the Satpura variety, walking west in the direction of the Arabian Sea.
The Aravalli variety in Rajasthan.
The Aravalli Range is the oldest mountain variety in India, running from northeast to southwest throughout Rajasthan in western India, extending about 500 km (310 miles). The northern cease of the range continues as isolated hills and rocky ridges into Haryana, ending near Delhi. The highest peak is Mount Abu, rising to one,722 m (5,653 ft), lying near the southwestern extremity of the variety, near the border with Gujarat. The metropolis of Ajmer with its lake lies on the southern slope of the variety in Rajasthan. The Aravalli Range is the eroded stub of an historical folded mountain gadget that was as soon as snow-capped. The range rose in a Precambrian occasion referred to as the Aravalli-Delhi orogen. The range joins of the ancient segments that make up the Indian craton, the Marwar phase to the northwest of the variety, and the Bundelkhand section to the southeast. The present Aravalli range is only a remnant of the massive machine that existed in prehistoric instances with several of its sum mits rising above the snow line and nourishing glaciers of stupendous value which in flip fed many first rate rivers.
Elevated areas in India.
The Western Ghats or Sahyadri mountains run along the western fringe of India’s Deccan Plateau, and separate the Deccan plateau from a slim coastal undeniable alongside the Arabian Sea. The range begins south of the Tapti River close to the border of Gujarat and Maharashtra, and runs approximately 1,six hundred km (1,000 miles) via the states of Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu, nearly to the southern tip of the Indian peninsula. The average elevation is round 1,000 m with the better peaks going on in the southern phase in Nilgiris and in Kerala. The Anai Mudi inside the Cardamom Hills at 2,695 m (eight,841 feet) in Kerala is the highest height within the Western Ghats.
The Eastern Ghats are a discontinuous range of mountains, which have been eroded and cut thru by way of the 4 most important rivers of southern India, the Godavari, Mahanadi, Krishna, and Kaveri. These mountain degrees make bigger from West Bengal inside the north, thru Orissa and Andhra Pradesh to Tamil Nadu within the south. They run parallel to the Bay of Bengal and are not as tall as the Western Ghats, even though some of its peaks are over one thousand m in height.
The Eastern and Western Ghats meet at the Nilgiri or Malay knot in Tamil Nadu. The Anai Mudi inside the Cardamom Hills at 2,695 m (eight,841 ft) in Kerala is the very best peak inside the Western Ghats. The Nilgiris are considered to be a part of the Western Ghats.
Indo-Gangetic undeniable
Extent of the Indo-Gangetic plain across South Asia.
The Indo-Gangetic plains are big floodplains of the Indus and the Ganga- Brahmaputra river structures. They run parallel to the Himalaya mountains, from Jammu and Kashmir in the west to Assam within the east, draining the states of Punjab, Haryana, jap Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal. The plains embody a place of seven hundred,000 km² (270,000 mile²) and range in width through their period via numerous hundred kilometres. Major rivers that form a part of this system are the Ganga (Ganges) and Indus River at the side of their tributaries; Beas, Yamuna, Gomti, Ravi, Chambal, Sutlej and Chenab.
The Indo-Gangetic belt is the world’s maximum full-size expanse of uninterrupted alluvium shaped through the deposition of silt via the numerous rivers. The plains are flat and primarily treeless, making it conducive for irrigation via canals. The place is also wealthy in ground water sources.
The plains are one of the world’s most intensely farmed areas. Crops grown on the Indo-Gangetic Plain are mostly rice and wheat, grown in rotation. Other plants include maize, sugarcane and cotton. Also called the Great Plains, the Indo-Gangetic plains rank many of the world’s most densely populated areas. Water our bodies of India are Indian ocean, arabian sea, bay of bengal.
Thar Desert
Jaisalmer in Rajasthan is situated inside the heart of the Thar Desert. The area is arid and dusty.
The Thar Desert (additionally called the Great Indian Desert) is a hot desolate tract that bureaucracy a significant part of western India. Spread over 4 states in India – Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, and Gujarat it covers an area of 208,a hundred and ten km² (80,350 mile²). The wilderness maintains into Pakistan as the Cholistan Desert. Most of the Thar Desert is situated in Rajasthan, protecting sixty one% of its geographic location. Most of the barren region is rocky, with a small a part of the extreme west of the wilderness being sandy.
The beginning of the Thar Desert is uncertain. Some geologists don’t forget it to be 4,000 to ten,000 years vintage, while others state that aridity started out on this vicinity a good deal in advance. The area is characterized through intense temperatures of above 45 ° C (113 ° F) in summer time to beneath freezing in winters. Rainfall is precarious and erratic, starting from below a hundred and twenty mm (four.Seventy two in) in the intense west to 375 mm (14.Seventy five in) eastward. The loss of rainfall is specially due to the precise function of the desert with recognize to the Aravalli range. The barren region lies inside the rain shadow area of the Bay of Bengal arm of the southwest monsoon. The parallel nature of the range to the Arabian Sea arm also method that the barren region does not receive much rainfall.
The desert may be divided into areas, the terrific Desert and the little wasteland. The great Desert extends northwards from the edge of the Rann of Kutch vicinity of Gujarat. The little desert extends from the River Luni among the towns of Jodhpur and Jaisalmer, as much as the northern regions. The soils of the arid vicinity are commonly sandy to sandy-loam in texture. The consistency and depth vary according to the topographical capabilities. The low-lying loams are heavier and may have a tough pan of clay, calcium carbonate or gypsum. Due to the low population density, the effect of the population at the environment is relatively less as compared to the relaxation of India.
Highlands
The Central Highlands are composed of 3 predominant plateaus – the Malwa Plateau in the west, the Deccan Plateau in the south, (overlaying most of the Indian peninsula); and the Chota Nagpur Plateau in Jharkhand in the direction of the east.
Satellite photo of the Deccan vicinity of southern India
The Deccan plateau is a huge triangular plateau, bounded by means of the Vindhyas to the north and flanked by the Eastern and Western Ghats. The Deccan covers a total area of 1.Nine million km² (735,000 mile²). It is generally flat, with elevations starting from 300 to 600 m (1,000 to 2,000 ft).
The name Deccan comes from the Sanskrit word dakshina, because of this “the south”. The plateau slopes gently from west to east and offers upward push to several peninsular rivers such as the Godavari, the Krishna, the Kaveri and the Narmada. This place is mostly semi-arid as it lies on the leeward aspect of both Ghats. Much of the Deccan is included by using thorn scrub forest scattered with small regions of deciduous broadleaf woodland. Climate ranges from warm summers to mild winters.
The Chota Nagpur Plateau is a plateau in jap India, which covers a good deal of Jharkhand nation as well as adjacent elements of Orissa, Bihar, and Chhattisgarh. The general location of Chota Nagpur Plateau is approximately sixty five,000 km² (25,000 mile²). The Chota Nagpur Plateau is made of 3 smaller plateaus, the Ranchi, Hazaribagh, and Kodarma plateaus. The Ranchi plateau is the largest of the plateaus, with a mean elevation of seven-hundred m (2,300 ft). Much of the plateau is forested, blanketed by means of the Chota Nagpur dry deciduous forests. The plateau is famous for its extensive reserves of ores and coal.
Besides the Great Indian peninsula, the Kathiawar Peninsula in Gujarat is every other big peninsula of India.
East coast
The Eastern Coastal Plain is a huge stretch of land mendacity between the Eastern Ghats and the Bay of Bengal. It stretches from Tamil Nadu in the south to West Bengal inside the north. Deltas of many of India’s rivers form a primary component of those plains. The Mahanadi, Godavari, Kaveri and Krishna rivers drain those plains. The area receives each the Northeast and Southwest monsoon rains with its annual rainfall averaging among 1,000 mm (forty in) and three,000 mm (a hundred and twenty in). The width of the plains varies between 100 to one hundred thirty km (62 to eighty miles).
The plains are divided into six regions: The Mahanadi delta; the southern Andhra Pradesh plain; the Krishna Godavari deltas; the Kanyakumari coast; Coromandel Coast and sandy littoral.
West coast
A view of India’s west coast at Goa, close to the border with Maharashtra.
The Western Coastal Plain is a slender strip of land sandwiched between the Western Ghats and the Arabian Sea. The strip starts in Gujarat inside the north and extends throughout the states of Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka and Kerala. The plains are slender, and variety from 50 to a hundred km (30 to 60 miles) in width.
Small rivers and numerous backwaters inundate the place. The rivers, which originate inside the Western Ghats, are rapid flowing and are more often than not perennial. The rapid flowing nature of the rivers effects within the formation of estuaries rather than deltas. Major rivers flowing into the ocean are the Tapi, Narmada, Mandovi and Zuari.
The coast is split into 3 regions. The northern area of Maharashtra and Goa is known as the Konkan Coast, the important vicinity of Karnataka is referred to as the Kanara Coast and the southern shoreline of Kerala is known as the Malabar Coast. Vegetation in this vicinity is normally deciduous. The Malabar Coast has its personal precise ecoregion known as the Malabar Coast wet forests.
Islands
India has primary offshore island possessions: the Lakshadweep islands and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Both these island organizations are administered by the Union authorities of India as Union Territories.
The Lakshadweep islands lie two hundred to three hundred km (124 to 186 miles) off the coast of Kerala in the Arabian Sea. It consists of twelve coral atolls, 3 coral reefs, and five banks. Ten of these islands are inhabited.
The Andaman and Nicobar island chain lies in the Bay of Bengal near the Myanmar coast. It is placed 950 km (590 miles) from Kolkata (Calcutta) and 193 km (one hundred twenty miles) from Cape Negrais in Myanmar. The territory consists of island businesses, the Andaman Islands and the Nicobar Islands. The Andaman islands encompass 204 islands having a total period of 352 km (220 miles). The Nicobar Islands, which lie south of the Andamans, includes twenty- islands with a complete location of 1,841 km² (710 mile²). The highest factor is Mount Thullier at 642 m (2,a hundred and forty toes). Indira Point, India’s southernmost land point is located within the Nicobar islands, and lies simply 189 km (117 miles) from the Indonesian island of Sumatra to the southeast.
Significant islands just off the Indian coast encompass Diu, a former Portuguese exclave; Majuli, Asia’s largest freshwater island; Salcette Island, India’s most populous island, on which Mumbai (Bombay) metropolis is located; Elephanta in Bombay Harbour; and Sriharikota barrier island in Andhra Pradesh.
Also read :