India Geography: A Comprehensive Overview of the Land and Regions

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Introduction to Geography of India

India, or Republic of India, a country in southern Asia and a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. India is an English word derived from the Sanskrit sindhu, which means river and was originally applied to the part of the Indus River now in Pakistan. In Hindi, the official national language established by the Indian constitution, the nation is called Bharat.

With more than one billion people, representing many language and ethnic groups. India is an extremely diverse country. It is held together largely by centuries-old religious and social customs. India is the home of one of the world's oldest civilizations—dating back more than 3,000 years—and the birthplace of several religions, including Hinduism, still the faith of most Indians, and Buddhism, now little practiced in the land of its origin. A century and a half of British rule, ending with independence in 1947, left its mark in various ways, including widespread use of the English language and a parliamentary system of government.

India in brief

Physical Geography

India is a large country in southern Asia.Location and Size

India occupies the greater part of a peninsular subcontinent fronting on two great arms of the Indian Ocean—the Arabian Sea on the west and the Bay of Bengal on the east. Just off its southern coast lies the island nation of Sri Lanka, separated from the mainland by the Palk Strait. Land boundaries are shared with Pakistan, China. Nepal, Bhutan, Burma, and Bangladesh. On the northwestern frontier is the disputed territory of Kashmir; although India claims all of Kashmir, it holds only the southern part, the rest being occupied by Pakistan.

Land

India has three distinct physical regions: the Himalayas, the Ganges Plain, and the Deccan Plateau.

The Himalayas extend along the nation's northern border, forming a high mountain wall, 100 to 150 miles (160 to 240 km) wide, that separates the Indian subcontinent from Asia's interior. The region consists of a complex system of mountain ranges that divide into three roughly parallel chains: the Siwalik Hills, Lesser Himalayas, and Great Himalayas. Several other ranges strike off from the Himalayas along the Burmese border.

In the towering, snow-covered ranges of the Great Himalayas are many of the world's highest peaks. Though the highest summits are in Nepal and China, numerous peaks in India exceed 20,000 feet (6,100 m) above sea level. Kanchenjunga, the nation's highest, reaches 28,209 feet (8,598 m). Heights of 5,000 to 15,000 feet (1,500 to 4,500 m) mark the Middle Himalayas, which, in turn, give way to low foothills of less than 4,000 feet (1,200 m) in the Outer Himalayas.

Huge glaciers and snowfields on the flanks of the higher ranges feed rivers that flow southward through deep gorges and narrow, steep-sided valleys to the Ganges Plain.

The Ganges Plain is a broad, alluvial lowland, 100 to 300 miles (160 to 480 km) wide, spanning the country south of the Himalayas. It consists mainly of the fertile basin of the Ganges River. The land is generally flat, with a slight downward slope toward the east. Much of India's farmland and many of its largest cities are on the plain, one of the most densely settled areas on earth. Only the Thar (Great Indian) Desert, an almost barren area in the west, is sparsely populated and little used.

The Deccan Plateau, often called simply the Deccan, occupies the peninsula south of the Ganges Plain. It is roughly triangular in shape and consists of a vast tableland broken by river valleys, with areas of rolling hills. The land slopes gently downward toward the east.

Fringing the Deccan on the north are the Chota Nagpur Plateau and a maze of low mountains, including the Vindhya and Satpura ranges, in the west. Elsewhere the plateau is bordered by escarpments, known as ghats. The Western Ghats, 3,000 to 5,000 feet (900 to 1,500 m) high, form a sheer wall that drops abruptly to a narrow coastal plain along the Arabian Sea. The Eastern Ghats, in contrast, consist of low, disconnected ranges that slope gently toward a broader coastal plain along the Bay of Bengal. At the southern end of the peninsula, connecting the Eastern and Western Ghats, are the Nilgiri, Anaimalai, and Cardamom hills.

Water

India's principal river is the Ganges. It flows from the western Himalayas to the Bay of Bengal—a distance of more than 1,500 miles (2,400 km). Together with such tributaries as the Yamuna, Son, Ghaghara, and Gandak, the Ganges drains most of the mountains and the plains and part of the Deccan. In the northeast the Brahmaputra River follows a tortuous course through the Assam Valley from China and merges with the Ganges to form a vast delta, lying partly in India and partly in Bangladesh. The Ravi and Sutlej rivers, part of the Indus system, flow across northern India to Pakistan.

The Deccan is drained primarily by the eastward-flowing Mahanadi, Godavari, Krishna, and Cauvery rivers. They form large, fertile deltas at their mouths on the Bay of Bengal. The Narmada and Tapti are the only sizable rivers flowing to the Arabian Sea.

India's rivers are used extensively for irrigation; they are also used for hydroelectric power and navigation. Of particular importance is the Indus River system, which provides water for the dry Punjab region of India and Pakistan. The Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 allocates the waters of the Ravi and Sutlej to India and the waters of the Indus and its other major tributaries to Pakistan. Bhakra Dam, on the Sutlej River, is the largest of many dams in India and one of the highest dams in the world.

Climate

Sheltered by the Himalayas from the climatic extremes of Asia's interior, most of India has a tropical or subtropical climate, strongly influenced by the monsoonal wind system of southern Asia. In India the monsoons are characterized by an outward flow of relatively cool, dry air from central Asia during winter and a reverse flow of warm, moist air from the sea in summer. Other factors—such as latitude, elevation, nearness to the oceans, and location on the windward or leeward side of mountains—help determine the climate of any given area. In the Himalayas, for example, climate varies from humid subtropical in the eastern foothills to perpetually cold in the highest ranges.

Three seasons are generally recognized in India—the cool, the hot, and the rainy.

The cool season lasts from October or November until early March. Average temperatures in December and January, the coolest months, vary from about 55° F. (13° C.) on the northern edge of the Ganges Plain to between 70° and 80° F. (21° and 27° C.) in the coastal cities of the south. For most of the country this is the dry season. A notable exception is the southeastern coast, which receives much of its annual rainfall with the winter, or northeast, monsoon in October, November, and December. There is heavy snowfall in the Himalayas.

The hot season prevails from about mid-March until June; it is extremely dry. Temperatures rise rapidly over most of the country, reaching averages of 85° to 95° F. (29° to 35° C.) in May, the hottest month. Daytime highs often exceed 100° F. (38° C.), especially on the Ganges Plain. Nights bring only slight relief from the intense heat.

The rainy season begins in June with the onset of the summer, or southwest, monsoon and continues through September. Most of India receives more than 80 per cent of its annual rainfall during this period. In addition to rain, the summer monsoon brings a reduction in the heat, but causes high, often oppressive, humidity. The heaviest rains, totaling more than 100 inches (2,540 mm) a year, occur in the northeast and along the Malabar Coast in the southwest. At Cherrapunji, in Meghalaya state in the northeast, the annual average is about 425 inches (10,800 mm)—one of the highest in the world. Elsewhere rainfall usually varies from 20 to 80 inches (500 to 2,000 mm) a year. Only the Thar Desert receives less than 10 inches (250 mm).

The summer monsoon is vital to India's agriculture. The timing and the amount of the rains can mean the difference between a successful harvest and widespread crop failure and famine.

Vegetation

Long ago, most of India was forested. Except in the more remote mountains and hills, the trees were cut for firewood or timber, or to make room for agriculture. Today, forests cover only about a fifth of the land, with much of the rest being farmland. Scrub, dry grasses, and desert plants are the principal vegetation on most of the remaining land.

Forests grow mainly on the slopes of the Himalayas and Western Ghats and along the northern edge of the Deccan. Differences in climate and elevation produce many kinds of forest. The most widespread is the deciduous monsoon type, which grows in areas receiving 40 to 80 inches (1,000 to 2,000 mm) of rainfall a year. It contains such valuable timber trees as sal, teak, ebony, and rosewood. Dense tropical evergreen forests occur in parts of the southwest. In the Himalayas temperate forests of pine, spruce, fir, oak, poplar, and birch predominate. Bamboo, which grows throughout much of India, is widely used for making furniture, household items, and paper.

Wildlife

India has rich and varied wildlife, though most of the larger animals have been greatly reduced in number and range. Tigers, elephants, and rhinoceroses, once widespread, are now restricted mainly to remote mountain and forest regions. Lions have become extremely rare; they are found only in the Gir Forest of Gujarat. Large animals less affected by the encroachment of man include bears, wolves, leopards, cheetahs, hyenas, and deer. Monkeys and mongooses are among the most numerous of India's many small mammals. In some regions, the monkeys, seldom killed because they have religious significance to Hindus, have become serious pests, destroying valuable food crops. Snakes, crocodiles, and other reptiles abound in India. The poisonous cobra and krait, two of the world's deadliest snakes, cause thousands of deaths each year.

Economy

India has elements of both a modern industrial economy and a subsistence economy. Since independence in 1947, the nation has directed its efforts largely to improving and developing manufacturing industries. As a result, it now produces many and varied manufactured goods, including many technologically advanced products. Manufacturing employs an increasing number of people and produces some of India's chief exports. Many Indians, however, live much as their ancestors did and are outside of the modern industrial economy. Most farmers grow barely enough food to feed themselves and their families. In cities, millions of people earn meager wages at unskilled jobs or are unemployed.

Efforts to raise India's standard of living have been hindered largely by rapid population growth.

Since the early 1950's India's economic system has been based largely on the doctrine of democratic socialism. Private enterprise predominates, but is combined with public (that is, government) ownership of certain basic industries and financial institutions. In general, the government has expanded its economic role by establishing new enterprises rather than by nationalizing existing ones. Only the transportation, communications, banking, and insurance industries have been largely or completely nationalized. Since 1951 economic development has been guided by a series of five-year plans, designed to stimulate industrialization and improve agriculture.

Agriculture

The success of India's development plans depends heavily on the nation's ability to modernize its agriculture, which supports about 60 per cent of the people and provides about 30 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP). Much of the nation's food and many industrial raw materials come from farming; yet agriculture is probably the segment of the economy most in need of modernization. Most farmers work small family plots of less than five acres (2 hectares), using age-old methods.

Government programs designed to aid agriculture stress land reform, improved irrigation and rural transportation, formation of farmers' cooperatives, and introduction of fertilizer, pesticides, and high-yielding seed. In areas where these programs have been implemented crop yields have risen sharply, resulting in a significant increase in the supply of food, particularly of such staples as rice and wheat. In years with good rainfall there has been surplus grain production. Food production as a whole is sufficient to meet domestic requirements. Occasional droughts and floods, however, cause food shortages in some areas.

Roughly half of India's area, or about 420 million acres (170 million hectares), is cultivated—more land than in any other nation except the United States. The nation's vast irrigation system serves a fourth of the farmland. The rest of the farmland receives virtually all of its water from the monsoon rains, which are highly variable in amount; consequently, crop yields can fluctuate widely from year to year.

Cereals and other staples take up about three-fourths of the cropland. India grows more rice than any country except China and is also a major wheat producer. Rice predominates on the lower Ganges Plain, in Assam, and along the eastern and southwestern coasts. Wheat is grown mainly on the drier central and western plains, which are unsuited to rice. Other cereals produced in large quantities include sorghum, millet, and corn. Chickpeas, lentils, and dry beans are the principal noncereal foods grown. They constitute the chief source of protein in India, where meat consumption is restricted by religious beliefs.

The remaining one-fourth of the farmland is devoted to commercial crops. India is one of the world's leading producers of tea, peanuts, cotton, jute, sugarcane, and tobacco. Rubber, coffee, and spices are also important. The commercial crops, grown on both small farms and large plantations, provide raw materials for domestic industries and, as exports, earn much of the nation's foreign exchange.

India has a huge domestic animal population, with cattle the most numerous. They are widely used as draft animals and provide milk, fuel (dried dung), and manure for fertilizer. Because cattle have religious significance to Hindus, they are rarely slaughtered and eaten. Large numbers of sheep and goats are raised for meat, milk, wool, hair, and skins.

Manufacturing

Except for textile milling, which was established on a large scale in the 1850's, India had little modern manufacturing prior to independence in 1947. Since then industrialization has progressed rapidly, drawing on the nation's relatively abundant raw materials and aided by public and private investment. Great emphasis has been placed on the development of heavy industry, much of which is controlled wholly or partly by the government. The production of consumer goods has also increased, but at a slower rate. Except for some metallurgical industries, located near the source of raw materials, manufacturing is concentrated in and around major cities, especially Mumbai (Bombay), Kolkata (Calcutta), and Chennai (Madras).

In addition to supporting modern factory development, the government has encouraged the expansion of cottage industries—small-scale manufacturing enterprises operated out of the home. These enterprises employ several times the number of workers employed by factories and provide many of the items used in everyday life.

Textile milling remains India's largest and best-developed industry, in both employment and value of output. The nation is one of the world's leading manufacturers of cotton and jute textiles and also produces woolen, silk, and synthetic goods. Mechanized mills contribute most of the textile output; however, wool and silk textiles are produced predominantly by cottage industries.

The making of iron and steel is India's chief heavy industry. Government-owned steel mills, built under the five-year plans, account for most of the steel produced. The rest comes from plants that are privately owned or jointly owned by the government and private concerns. Other prominent manufacturing industries include petroleum refining and the making of chemicals and fertilizers, motor vehicles, aircraft, ships, machinery, electrical equipment, aluminum, and cement. Also important are food processing, primarily the refining of sugar and the production of vegetable oils; metal fabricating; printing and publishing; and the making of rubber goods, tobacco products, and paper.

India makes numerous technologically advanced products such as electronic devices and precision instruments. However, their contribution to the economy is small in terms of employment and value of production.

Mining

India has abundant and varied mineral resources, and mining is an important activity. Like most other large-scale undertakings, mining is divided between the public and private sectors of the economy, with new development the responsibility of the government.

Coal and petroleum are the nation's principal mineral resources, accounting for most of the value of all minerals produced. Wells in Assam and Gujarat and in the Gulf of Cambay, an arm of the Arabian Sea, produce most of the petroleum. Coal is mined primarily in the eastern states of Bihar, West Bengal, and Madhya Pradesh. India has a large share of the world's known reserves of iron ore, which is mined in large amounts both for domestic use and for export. Other minerals that rank high in both production and value include mica, manganese, chromite, and bauxite.

Fishing

Although fishing has considerable economic potential, it is not a major activity in India. Fish make up a minor part of the Indian diet, being widely eaten only in coastal areas and the island territories. A small but growing commercial fishing industry yields mainly shrimp for export.

Transportation

India has an extensive government-owned and -operated railway network, which was begun under the British. The railways serve all major cities and carry most of the nation's freight and passenger traffic.

National highways link state capitals and major ports and connect with the highways of neighboring countries. Many roads, however, are narrow and often impassable during the summer monsoon. The use of motor vehicles and bicycles is increasing rapidly, particularly in urban areas. However, most $rroads are not suited to a heavy volume of traffic, and congestion is becoming a serious problem.

Some of India's rivers are important transportation routes. The Ganges, Brahmaputra, Godavari, and Krishna rivers carry most of the waterborne traffic. Ocean shipping is concentrated at nine major seaports —Kolkata, Paradip, Visakhapatnam, and Chennai on the east coast and Kandla, Mumbai, Marmagao, Mangalore, and Cochin on the west coast. These ports handle nearly all of India's foreign trade. Dozens of smaller ports are engaged in extensive coastal trade.

Air transportation is well developed and is provided mainly by two airlines: Air India, which is the long-distance international carrier, and Indian Airlines, which serves cities within India and also flies to adjacent countries. Numerous foreign carriers provide international service through airports at Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, and Chennai.

Trade

India's imports exceed exports by a large margin in terms of value. Major imports include petroleum and petroleum products, machinery, pearls, and precious and semiprecious stones. Among the major exports are jewelry and gems, transportation equipment, garments, chemicals, and cotton textiles. The United States is India's principal trading partner. Other important trading partners include Japan, Germany, Belgium, Great Britain, Saudi Arabia, and the countries of eastern Europe, especially the republics of the former Soviet Union.

Communications

The government owns and operates all postal, telephone, and telegraph services. Radio and television broadcasting is also a government monopoly. The All India Radio network (AIR) broadcasts in more than 40 languages and dialects. Because of the nation's high rate of illiteracy, radio is an extremely important means of getting educational material to the people.

The People

Most Indians are of Caucasian ancestry belonging to two chief subdivisions—the fairer-skinned Aryans and the darker-skinned Dravidians. The Aryans, who entered the country from the northwest, settled in northern India sometime between 2000 and 1500 b.c. The Dravidians of southern India may be descendants of people of an ancient civilization that flourished in the north around the Indus Valley before the Aryans arrived. ( )

Indian society, highly diverse, is divided into a great number of cultural groups, which are based mainly on religion, language, caste, and subcaste. There are thousands of castes and subcastes, and each identifies itself with one of the four main castes described in Hindu religious literature—Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, and Sudras. Below the castes in the social order is a class of people called the untouchables, who, historically, have been discriminated against. This discrimination is forbidden by the Indian constitution, but the practice continues. There are large numbers of tribal peoples who are not part of the caste system.

The family is one of the strongest social institutions, especially in rural areas. It is traditionally large, tightly knit, and under the authority of the oldest male. Social life for an Indian family revolves around the celebration of religious events and holidays, and the observing of ceremonies related to family births, marriages, and deaths.

Population

India is the second most populous country on earth; only China's population is larger. India's population increased by 21.34 per cent between 1991 and 2001. Distribution is extremely uneven, ranging from less than 10 persons per square mile (4 per km 2)in parts of the Thar Desert and the Himalayas to more than 7,000 times that much in the union territory of Delhi. About 72 per cent of the people live in rural areas, mainly in small agricultural towns and villages.

Language

India has more than 800 languages and dialects. The constitution declares Hindi the national language, but English is also an official language in government and is widely used. The constitution establishes for use in government 17 other major languages—Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu.

Education

is primarily the responsibility of the state governments. The union, or central, government coordinates facilities and standards in the states, administers education in the union territories, and controls four universities and certain special schools.

The literacy rate of India is about 50 per cent. The government's long-range aim is to provide free and compulsory education for all children from age 6 through 14. However, only about three-fourths of the school-age children attend school, largely because in rural areas many parents keep their children out of school to help with the farming.

Below the college level, the school system in each state has three basic stages—primary school, middle school, and high school. Depending on the state, primary school lasts four or five years, middle school two or three years, and high school two to five years. In grade school, instruction is in a language of the school's region; in secondary school, students must learn either Hindi or English.

Higher education is provided by numerous institutions—various kinds of colleges, technical institutes, and universities. There are more than 140 universities. English is the principal language in higher education.

Religion

Probably no country in the world has given birth to more religions than India. Hinduism and Buddhism originated in India, as did Sikhism and Jainism.

Hinduism. About 80 per cent of the people are Hindus. There are nearly 200 Hindu groups, embracing a wide range of beliefs. Hinduism is interwoven with every aspect of Indian life—social relations, government, law, literature, art, and science.

Islam. About 11 per cent of the Indian people are Muslims. Most Indian Muslims belong to the Sunnite branch.

Christianity. Between 2 and 3 per cent of the people are Christian. About 15 per cent of the Christians are Thomas Christians, who trace their origin to a church they believe was founded in 52 a.d. by the Apostle Thomas. Most other Indian Christians belong to churches established in India by missionaries in modern times. More than half the Christians are Roman Catholic.

Other Religions. Sikhism began in the 16th century as an attempt to unite Hindus and Muslims. Slightly less than 2 per cent of the population are followers. Jainism began in the sixth century b.c. as an attempt to reform Hinduism. Buddhism, though it originated in India, has only a small following. Zoroastrianism began in Persia in ancient times; its Indian followers are called Parsis. Judaism has had a small group in India since the fourth or fifth century A.D

The Arts

India has a very rich and ancient cultural heritage. Its Sanskrit literature, dating back to about 1500 B.C., ranks among the world's greatest literary achievements. Modern literary figures include the novelists Prem Chand, Qurratulain Hyder, and R. K. Narayan, and the poets Rabindranath Tagore (Nobel Prize in literature, 1913), Nirala, and Nissim Ezekiel.

Indian theater includes traditional Sanskrit plays, drama imported from Western countries, and drama in native languages but in the style of the Western world. Indian classical music emphasizes melody, rhythm, and improvisation. It is based on a melodic form called raga. There are thousands of ragas, each associated with a time of day, a season, or a special occasion. Ravi Shankar, a 20th-century concert musician, created an international audience for such music. Classical Indian dance was revived in the 20th century. India is one of the world's largest producers of motion pictures, which serve as the chief disseminator in India of popular music and dance. The director Salyajit Ray is known internationally.

Traditional art has been influenced largely by Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam. In general, Buddhist art has a serene quality while Hindu art is more animated and vigorous. Indian Islamic art is expressed mainly in architecture.

Sports and Recreation

Field hockey is India's national game, and the country regularly wins world championships in the sport. Soccer and cricket are other important spectator sports. Polo is popular with India's upper classes.

Government

Under its 1950 constitution India is a federal republic. It is a federal union of 28 states and 7 union territories. The president, who is head of state, is elected for a five-year term by an electoral college consisting of members from the national and state legislatures.

Executive power is exercised by the cabinet, headed by the prime minister. The cabinet is responsible to Parliament, which consists of the Council of States and the House of the People. Members of the Council of States are chosen by the members of the states' legislative bodies. The more than 200 council members serve six-year terms; about one-third are replaced every two years. The House of the People has more than 500 members elected directly for five-year terms.

The Supreme Court of India consists of the chief justice and not more than 17 judges appointed by the president. Each state has a governor appointed by the president, a council of ministers (cabinet), and a legislature.