Indian Geography – Physical Features
India is the 7th largest and 2nd most populous country in the world. It covers an area of 287782 sq kms with a land frontier of 15174 km and a coastline of 6083 km. With only about 2.4% of the total world area, India has about 15% of the world population which is next to China.
Physically India is cut off from the great part of Asia on account of the Himalayan mountain ranges in the North and the sea surrounding the peninsula. To the North West India shares a boundary mainly with Pakistan. To the east, India is bounded by Burma, while the territory of Bangladesh forms an enclave within India bounded by Indian states of West Bengal, Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram. To the south India tapers like a triangle, with its apex pointing downwards. At the Tropic of Cancer the landmass of the country thins between Bay of Bengal on the east and the Arabian Sea on the West. The Southern tip of India, Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin) is washed by the Indian Ocean. Off the Cape the Gulf of Mannar and Palk Strait separate India from Sri Lanka. The Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal and Lakshadweep are a part of Indian Territory.
India is more a subcontinent than a country. Its regional diversities are reflected in the mosaic of its myriad races, languages and religions, in the differing dress, mannerism, ways of life and thought, and its wide disparities in education and literacy, in income and wealth. India’s people range from primitive to the most sophisticated. In spite of these diversities and differences, India functions as world’s largest working democracy.
Geological History: The geological placement of India was for a long time one of the puzzles of geology. It is now believed that the explanation might lie in the drifting of continental masses over the surface of the world after the breakup of the ancient continent of Gondwanaland. One of these masses – peninsular – according to this theory, have collided with the southern shore of Asian land mass causing the uplifting of Himalayan mountain ranges. The erosive action of rivers flowing down from the Himalayas would then in subsequent eras have resulted in the creation of the Indo-Gangetic Plain, which today is one of the world’s longest stretches of alluvium and also one of the most densely populated areas in the world.
Geographic Regions: Geographically India can be divided into four distinct regions, namely, northern and coastal plains, peninsular plateau and the Islands. India has eight principal mountain ranges – The Himalayas, the North Eastern Mountain ranges, the Vindhyas, the Satpura range, The Aravallis, The Sahyadri, The Eastern Ghats and Nilgiri Hills. The Himalayas constitute the highest mountain system of the world, containing most of world’s highest peaks; some of them rise above 7500 meters. Mt Everest which dominates the Himalayas extends into Nepal and Tibet. Geologically, the Himalayas constitute the world’s youngest and longest east-west mountain system, extending almost without interruption for about 2400 kms. The Aravallis is one of the oldest mountain systems. Himalayan Mountain varies from 150 to 400 km with an average height of about 2000 metres. Except for the Polar Regions, India has the world’s largest area under snow and glaciers. The world’s largest mountain glaciers are to be found in Himalayas. The two highest ranges of the Himalayan system, the great Himalayas and the Karakoram have no parallel in any other mountain system in the world.
Plains: The plains in India cover more than 10 lakhs sq km, the greater part of which consists of the Indo- Gangetic Plain in the North. From the point of view of human use, the plains of India are the most important type of landform in the country. They represent the most extensively cultivated and densely populated area, particularly where water is available. There is also an extensive slice of plains land in South, mainly deltaic in character. These are known as coastal plains.
Plateau: Geologically, the peninsular plateau is the oldest past of India’s land surface. It consists largely of crystalline rocks in various stages of change and deformation. The peninsula or Deccan Plateau is bordered to the North by the Vindhya Mountains which separate it from the Indo-Gangetic Plain. Plateaus occur in other parts of India as well. Among the most notable, is the Ladakh Plateau which has an average elevation of almost 5200 mts and is situated in the north-eastern part of Kashmir Himalayas. It is the highest plateau in India and one of the most inaccessible
Islands: Andaman and Nicobar group of islands consist of about 200 islands and these are of volcanic origin. The Lakshadweep group of islands consists of 27 islands of coral origin.
Drainage and River system: India consist at least three major ground water basins. These are Ganges Basin, which is the largest, the Punjab alluvial basin in the northwest which runs from Ludhiana to Amritsar, and western basin covering a portion of Rajasthan and curving south towards the Gujarat plains as far as Ahmedabad. The underlying structure of the greater part of India is not favorable for storing up a substantial portion of the rains that precipitate during monsoon months.
Lakes: For such a large country, India has very few lakes. Most of the lakes in the Himalayas are basins scooped out by glaciers or dammed by moraines and subsequently filled with water. The Wular Lake, with an area varying from 18 to 160 sq kms is the largest lake in the Kashmir Valley. An example of Crater Lake of volcanic origin is the Lonar Lake in the Buldana district of Maharashtra, in the Deccan. There are a number of long lakes between sand dunes in western Rajasthan.
Rivers: India’s rivers fall in two broad categories – Himalayan Rivers and Peninsular Rivers. The Himalayan Rivers have large basins. They have a tortuous course near their places of origin and display strong meandering tendency in plain. Fed by snow and rain, they have an almost continuous flow. The Peninsular or Deccan rivers flow through shallow valleys, have little erosional activity and generally have straight courses. They are subject to great fluctuations in volume and many of them shrink into streamlets in the hot season or even dry up. Important among the Himalayan Rivers are the Ganga, The Indus and Brahmaputra systems. Important among the Peninsular Rivers are the Narmada, Tapi, Godavari, Krishna and the Kaveri. The Godavari is the largest of the Peninsular Rivers. Its basin is the second largest after that of Ganga. Apart from these two broad categories mentioned above there are two other minor categories. There are several streams rising in the Eastern and Western Ghats and draining into Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea respectively. These are known as coastal rivers. These are also rivers of the inland drainage basin. These are located in western Rajasthan and they drain towards salt lakes or are lost in the sands. More than 90% of India’s total surface runoff falls in Bay of Bengal and the rest into Arabian Sea. The East flowing rivers or the rivers fall into Bay of Bengal are Ganga, Godavari, Krishna Mahanadi, Kaveri and Pennar. The West flowing rivers which fall into Arabian Sea are Indus, Narmada, Tapi, Sabarmati and Mahi.
Climate and Seasons: India has a great diversity of Climate with many striking contrasts of meteorological conditions. Assam in the East and Rajasthan in the west are extreme examples of rainfall. Punjab in the North has continental climate with hot summer and cold winter, while Kerala in the South has tropical maritime climate. India’s climate is however broadly defined as tropical monsoon, highlighting dominant influence of the country’s tropical location and monsoon winds. Changes in the upper air conditions during the year and Himalayas are other important factors affecting it.
Rainfall: The Indian Economy depends entirely on the bounty of monsoons which brings the seasonal rains essential for agriculture, irrigation and power production. Although considerable areas of the country are provided for by irrigation from major and minor projects, nearly 80% of the cropped area still depends on seasonal rainfall. Hydro-electric power, which is about 35 % of the power produced in the country for agriculture, industry and domestic use, is also dependent on such rainfall. India has two monsoons, the south-west monsoon from June to September which accounts for 70% of the annual rainfall and the north-east monsoon from October to December which is important for Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu receives 50% rainfall from this monsoon. It also brings winter rainfall to Punjab. Unlike the south west monsoon winds, the north east monsoon winds are land winds and hence their effect in terms of rainfall is limited. Rainfall from these winds is low over much of India, though it is higher and fairly widespread in the Southern region, due to gathering moisture as it swings in from Bay of Bengal. But even in the South, the winter rainfall in the area is relatively low. The average rainfall in India is 125 cm the highest for land of such size anywhere in the world
