Geography of India

India Geography - Geographical divisions of India

Location - India is located 68" 7' to 97" 25' North longitude and 8" 4' to 37" 6' west latitude

Borders – In the north India has China, Nepal, Bhutan as neighbours. In the east, India shares border with Bangladesh. In the north-west Pakistan, Afghanistan are its neighbours. Arabian sea forms the border in the south-west, Bay of Bengal in the south-east and Indian ocean in the south. Sri Lanka in Indian Ocean in the south is India's southern neighbour. India shares a total of 15200 km of border with its neighbouring countries.

Extend – India is 3214 kms north to south and 2933 kms east to west. It has a total of 32,87,263 sq km under land area. India has a total of 7516 kms of sea shore.

Geographically India can be divided into 4 regions:

Deccan Plateau
Sindhu-Ganga Plains
Himalayas
Costal Plains

Mountain Ranges – There are 7 main mountain ranges in India. They are :

The Himalayas
Patkai
Vindhya Ranges
Sathpura
Aravalli
Sahyadri or the western ghats
Eastern Ghats

The Himalayas : Highest mountain range in the world. It extends over 2500kms. More than 10 mountains are over 7500 mts in height. Mount Everest is the highest with a height of 8848 mts. It is located on the Nepal-Tibet border. Kanchanjunga is the highest in India with a height of 8611 mts.

Patkai : Located in the Indo-Mynamar border. Know by different names in Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, mizoram etc..

Aarvali : It is one of the oldest mountain ranges on earth. The ranges were formed almost 70 crore years back. Starting from the Himalayan ranges it extends down to the Deccan Plateau.

Vindhya Ranges : It is located north of the Deccan Plateau extending to 1050 km north-east. Average height of the range is 300 mts.

Sathpura Ranges : Satpura ranges run parallel to vindhya ranges and are located towards the south of vindhya ranges. It is almost 900km in length and most of the mountains are over 1000 mts in height.

Sahyadri or Western Ghats : Starting from the Tapti river in the North to Kanyakumari in the south, the western ghats runs west of the deccan plateau and is 1600 kms in length. Average height the range is 1200 mts.

Eastern Ghat : It is the eastern border of Deccan region. The slope of this range is parallel to that of Aravalis. Mahendragiri (1000 mts) is the highest.

Climate : The climate of India changes considerably from north to south and from east to west. Some parts of Assam records the highest amount of rainfall in the world. Climate of India is greatly dependant on the Monsoon winds which changes its direction of flow with the change in season. There are four major seasons in India. They are :

December to February – Winter
March to May – Summer
June to September – South-west Monsoons
October to November – Retreating Monsoons

Rivers and Lakes : Rivers in India carry almost 1683000 million cubic meters of water every year. Indian rivers can be divided into 4. They are :

Central Indian and Rivers of the Deccan region
Himalayan Rivers
Coastal Rivers
Inland rivers

Lakes : Comparatively the number of lakes in India is less. Most of the lakes in India are located in the Himalayan regions. The woolaar lake in Kashmir with an area of 100 sqkm is one of the biggest lake in India.

India Geography explained in detail. Know more about the physical features of India like its geographical regions, Mountain Ranges, rivers, climate etc... India Physical features and India Geography related article.