An area’s physiography results from its structure, processes, and developmental stage. The physical characteristics of India’s terrain are quite diverse. The north contains a huge area of rough landscape made up of several mountain ranges with a variety of peak shapes, lovely valleys, and deep canyons. The south is made up of stable table terrain with deeply cut plateaus, bare rocks, and extensive scarp systems. The enormous north Indian plain is located between these two.
Based on these, India can be divided into five major physiographic divisions.
- Northern Mountains
- Northern / Gangetic Plains
- Peninsular Plateau
- Coastal Plains
- Islands
Northern Mountains
The collision between the Indian Plate and the Eurasian Plate, which started 50 million years ago and is still going on now, is what gave rise to the Himalayas. India was a sizable island still off the coast of Australia around 225 million years ago, and the Tethys Sea, a large ocean, formed the barrier separating India from the Asian continent. About 200 million years ago, as Pangaea disintegrated, India’s land mass started to move north.
