Map of India
ICSE Class 10 · Geography · Chapter 21
What this chapter covers
- Working with the outline map of India
- Latitude and longitude: the Tropic of Cancer and the Standard Meridian
- Mountains, peaks and plateaus
- Plains and desert
- Rivers of the north
- Rivers of the peninsula
- Water bodies and passes
- Direction of winds
- Distribution of minerals
- Soil distribution
- Cities
- Distribution of population
Key points
- The map of India question asks you to mark six features and identify four, on an outline map of India.
- The Tropic of Cancer (23°30′N) crosses eight states; the Standard Meridian (82°30′E) crosses five and fixes Indian Standard Time, 5 h 30 min ahead of Greenwich.
- Ranges to mark: Himalayas, Karakoram, Aravali (NE–SW across Rajasthan), Vindhyas and Satpura (either side of the Narmada), Western Ghats (continuous) and Eastern Ghats (broken), Nilgiris, Khasi.
- Peaks to mark: K2 (8,611 m) in the Karakoram, Kanchenjunga (8,586 m) on the Sikkim–Nepal border; plateaus to mark: Deccan and Chota Nagpur.
- Plains and desert to mark: Gangetic Plains; Konkan, Malabar, Coromandel and Northern Circars coasts; Thar Desert in western Rajasthan.
- Rivers to identify: the Indus and its five tributaries, the Ganga with the Yamuna, Chambal, Betwa, Gomti, Ghaghra, Gandak and Kosi, the Brahmaputra, the west-flowing Narmada and Tapti, and the east-flowing Mahanadi, Godavari, Krishna and Cauveri.
- Water bodies and pass to mark: Gulf of Kutch, Gulf of Khambhat, Gulf of Mannar, Palk Strait, Andaman Sea, Wular Lake and the Karakoram Pass.
- Winds to mark: both branches of the southwest monsoon, the northeast monsoon towards the Coromandel coast, and western disturbances entering from the northwest.
- Minerals to identify: Mumbai High (offshore oil), Digboi (oldest oil field, Assam), Singhbhum (iron, Jharkhand), Jharia (coal, Jharkhand).
- Soils to mark: alluvial on the northern plains and deltas, black on the lava Deccan, red over the southern and eastern peninsula.
- Cities to identify: Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Kochi and Allahabad (Prayagraj).
- Population to mark: dense on the Gangetic Plains, the coasts and big cities; sparse in the mountains, the Thar and the forested hills.
Questions answered
How many features are you expected to mark, and how many to identify, in the map of India question?
Six features are to be marked and four features are to be identified.
Define the Standard Meridian of India and name the five states it passes through.
The Standard Meridian of India is the line of longitude at 82°30′E, used to fix Indian Standard Time. It passes through Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh.
Indian Standard Time is 5 hours 30 minutes ahead of Greenwich. What is the time at Greenwich when it is 4:00 p.m. in Delhi?
4:00 p.m. - 5:30 = 10:30 a.m. at Greenwich.
Name the eight states through which the Tropic of Cancer passes.
Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Tripura and Mizoram.
Which range lies between the Narmada and the Tapti, and which lies just north of the Narmada?
The Satpura lies between the Narmada and the Tapti; the Vindhyas lie just north of the Narmada.
Why are the Eastern Ghats drawn as a broken line while the Western Ghats are drawn as a continuous one?
The Eastern Ghats are cut through by the Mahanadi, Godavari, Krishna and Cauveri, which flow east into the Bay of Bengal, so they are discontinuous. The Western Ghats are not crossed by any large river.
Where do the Western and Eastern Ghats meet, and what is the highest point there?
They meet in the Nilgiris, in western Tamil Nadu; the highest point is Doddabetta (2,637 m).
Name the five eastern tributaries of the Indus from west to east. Which of them flows wholly within India?
Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas and Satluj. The Beas flows wholly within India; it joins the Satluj at Harike in Punjab.
Past board exam questions
ICSE 2027 sample paper · 1 mark
Mark the following on the outline map of India provided: Mark and name the hill range where the Eastern Ghats and the Western Ghats meet.
Show answer
Mark the Nilgiri Hills at the meeting point of the Western and Eastern Ghats (Tamil Nadu–Kerala–Karnataka border) and name them 'Nilgiris'.
ICSE 2027 sample paper · 1 mark
Mark the following on the outline map of India provided: Mark and label the Wular Lake.
Show answer
Mark the Wular Lake in the Kashmir Valley (Jammu and Kashmir), north-west of Srinagar, on the course of the Jhelum, and label it 'Wular Lake'.
ICSE 2027 sample paper · 1 mark
Mark the following on the outline map of India provided: Write SP over a sparsely populated area north of Tropic of Cancer.
Show answer
Write SP over the Thar Desert in western Rajasthan (or Ladakh / Arunachal Pradesh), all north of the Tropic of Cancer.
ICSE 2027 sample paper · 1 mark
Mark the following on the outline map of India provided: Shade and label an area of black soil.
Show answer
Shade the Deccan lava plateau (Maharashtra, western Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat interior) and label it 'Black soil'.
ICSE 2027 sample paper · 1 mark
Mark the following on the outline map of India provided: Shade and label the Gulf of Kutch.
Show answer
Shade the Gulf of Kutch, the inlet of the Arabian Sea between Kutch and the Kathiawar peninsula (Gujarat), and label it.
ICSE 2027 sample paper · 1 mark
Mark the following on the outline map of India provided: Mark and label the wind that brings rain to Mumbai in July.
Show answer
Draw arrows from the Arabian Sea striking the west coast near Mumbai from the south-west and label them 'S.W. Monsoon winds – Arabian Sea branch'.
ICSE 2026 board paper · 1 mark
On the outline map of India provided: Mark and name an old fold mountain range of India.
Show answer
The Aravalli Range, marked as a line running north-east to south-west across Rajasthan from near Delhi to Gujarat.
ICSE 2026 sample paper · 1 mark
On the outline map of India provided: Mark using a dot and name a major river port of India.
Show answer
Mark a dot at Kolkata on the Hooghly river and write 'Kolkata (river port)'.