Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The Lie of The Land
The three major geographic features that define modern-day India are the Himalayan peaks
and hills along the northern borders, the alluvial floodplains of the Indus and Ganges
Rivers in the north, and the elevated Deccan Plateau that forms the core of India's triangu-
lar southern peninsula.
The Himalaya
As the world's highest mountains - with the highest peak in India (Khangchendzonga)
reaching 8598m - the Himalaya create an almost impregnable boundary separating India
from its neighbours to the north. These mountains formed when the Indian subcontinent
broke away from Gondwanaland, a supercontinent in the southern hemisphere that included
Africa, Antarctica, Australia and South America. All by itself, India drifted north and fi-
nally slammed slowly, but with immense force, into the Eurasian continent about 40 milli-
on years ago, buckling the ancient seafloor upward to form the Himalaya and many lesser
ranges that stretch 2500km from Afghanistan to Myanmar (Burma).
When the Himalaya reached its great heights during the Pleistocene (less than 150,000
years ago), it blocked and altered weather systems, creating the monsoon climate that dom-
inates India today, as well as forming a dry rainshadow to the north.
The Indo-Gangetic Plains
Covering most of northern India, the vast alluvial plains of the sacred Ganges River are so
flat that they drop a mere 200m between Delhi and the waterlogged wetlands of West
Bengal, where the river joins forces with the Brahmaputra River from India's northeast be-
fore dumping into the sea in Bangladesh. Vast quantities of eroded sediments from the
neighbouring highlands accumulate on the plains to a depth of nearly 2km, creating fertile,
well-watered agricultural land. This densely populated region was once extensively fores-
ted and rich in wildlife.
The Deccan Plateau
South of the Indo-Gangetic (northern) plain, the land rises to the Deccan Plateau, marking
the divide between the Mughal heartlands of North India and the Dravidian civilisations of
the south. The Deccan is bound on either side by the Western and Eastern Ghats, which
come together in their southern reaches to form the Nilgiri Hills in Tamil Nadu.
