Peninsular India

The Peninsular India comprises the diverse topological and climatic patterns of South India. The Peninsula is in shape of a vast inverted triangle, bounded on the west by the Arabian Sea, on the east by the Bay of Bengal and on the north by the Vindhya and Satpura ranges. The line created by the Narmada River and Mahanadi river is the traditional boundary between northern and southern India. Covering an area of about 16 Lakh km², the peninsular upland forms the largest physiographic division of India. It is bounded by the Aravallis in the North West, Hazaribagh and Rajmahal Hills in the northeast, the Western Ghats (Sahayadri Mountains) in the west and the Eastern Ghats in the east.  The highest peak of Peninsular India is Anamudi that is 2695 metres above sea level.

The narrow strip of verdant land between the Western Ghats and the Arabian Sea is the Konkan region; the term encompasses the area south of the Narmada as far as Goa. The Western Ghats continue south, forming the Malnad (Canara) region along the Karnataka coast, and terminate at the Nilgiri mountains, an inward (easterly) extension of the Western Ghats. The Nilgiris run in a crescent approximately along the borders of Tamil Nadu with northern Kerala and Karnataka, encompassing the Palakkad and Wayanad hills, and the Satyamangalam ranges, and extending on to the relatively low-lying hills of the Eastern Ghats, on the western portion of the Tamil Nadu–Andhra Pradesh border. The Tirupati and Anaimalai hills form part of this range.

The Deccan plateau, covering the major portion of the states of Maharashtra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, is the vast elevated region bound by the C-shape defined by all these mountain ranges. No major elevations border the plateau to the east, and it slopes gently from the Western Ghats to the eastern coast.

The Peninsular India can be divided into four regions viz. Central Highlands, Deccan Plateau, Western Ghats or Sahayadri and Eastern Ghats


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