State briefly the distinct geographical identity of India
Answers
Geographically India is divided into four physical divisions:
(i) The great Mountain Walls.
(ii) The great Indo-Gangetic plain.
(iii) The great Deccan Plateau and
(iv) The Coastal Ghats.
(i) The Great Mountain Walls or the Mountain Ranges of the Himalayas:
In the north the mighty Himalayas with its lofty mountain ranges and majestic peaks stretching from East to West is protecting the country from external aggression like a gigantic sentinel. The great mountain wall is about 2500 km. long and its width varies from 240 km. to 320 km. Mount Everest is the highest peak known to be the highest in the world with a height of 29,142 feet.
The ranges of Himalayas can be divided into two groups. The high mountain portions are covered with snow round the year. The holy rivers like the Gangas, the Jamuna and the Brahmaputra have originated from the Snow Mountains. The Western off shoots of the Himalayas consists of Hindu Kush, the safed Koh, the Sulaiman Koh, and the ‘Kirthar ranges’.
The height of the mountain in these regions are corporately low, the area is dry with scanty rainfall. In this belt there are several famous passes named the khyber, the Kuuram, the Tochi, the Gomal and the Bolan passes. Most of these passes are situated in low lying ground and thereby has made the country accessible to the foreign invaders.
(ii) The great Indo-Gangetic Plain or Northern Plain:
It embraces the valleys of the Indus and the tributaries, the sandy deserts of Sind and Rajputana as well as the fertile region watered by the Ganges, the Jamuna and the Brahmaputra. It has always been the core of the Indian Continent. The plain formed by the deposit of rich soil washed down during countless centuries from the vast Himalayan ranges on the north and from the hills and uplands of the Deccan of the South.
The river system of Northern India namely the Indus and its tributaries—(the Sutlej, the Ravi, the Beas, the Chenab and the Jhelum), the Ganges and its affluent (the Jamuna, the Chambal, the Gomti, the Ghagra and the Sone) and the Brahmaputra and its feeders irrigate this wide plain.
These rivers played an important part in the evolution of Indian culture. It was in the valley of the river Indus that the earliest civilization of India flourished (Mohanjodaro and Harappa). The rivers of the Punjab and the Ganges determined also the nature and the course of the Aryan settlements in India.
(iii) The great Deccan Plateau:
The Deccan Plateau lies in the south of Indo-Gangetic plain. On its north the Vindhya and the Satpura ranges separates it from Indo-Gangetic plain and slope-down to the Cape Comerin. In the east it starts from the Bay of Bengal and spreads right up to Arabian Sea in the West. Rivers like the Godavari, the Krishna, the Kaveri, the Tungabhadra have swept the land and made the plateau highly covetous.
The sharp geographical feature has made the region distinctly different and considerably influenced the course of our history. Geographical condition has created several natural barriers which denied easy and smooth access from north to south. The Vindhynchal and the Satpura range, the dense forest around it have virtually prevented free- entry into the plateau.
Seas on three sides acted as strong hurdle forbidding uninterrupted intercourse from outside. Thus the plateau practically remained isolated from the north and countries. However it enjoyed a special significance and proved useful in many ways in building Indian history.
(iv) Coastal Ghats:
The Coastal Ghats broadly forms the coast-belts of East and West of the Deccan Plateau. On the eastern side of the plateau the hill range running from the north to the South almost parallel to the coast line is known as the Eastern Ghats. On the West the mountain range running parallel to the Arabian sea is known as the Western Ghats.
The length is about 1120 km. and 3000 to 8000 feet above sea level. The lofty cliff has given positive advantages to build up a strong and formidable defence. This natural gift of nature has virtually helped the Marathas to defy the fierce Mughals and assert their superiority. The narrow strip of land sometimes not more than 32 km. in width stretching between coast and foot of the Ghats is known as Konkan and Malabar.
It has a rich soil and is evergreen with rice plants and coconut trees. It is highly productive and thickly populated. In the absence of modern communication facilities it remained isolated for a long time from the rest of the Deccan. Even now some of them practise customs found nowhere else in India.