India

India is a country located in South Asia. Where I live which is the second most populous country in the world having population over 1.2 billion people. It is bounded by Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the south-west and the Bay of Bengal in south-east. The name India is derived from word Indus, which originates from the old Persian word Hindu. The geographical term Bharat which is recognised by Constitution of India as the official name of country. India shares it’s borders with Pakistan, Nepal, China, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Maldives. I’m living in India since my birth. Today is a Hindu festival named Holi. India is the world’s largest democracy and according to UN estimates India’s population might overtake China’s population in 2028. This is concerning though. And I also feel sometimes that it’s highly populated but now it’s kind of movement adapted to this environment now. India is a secular country that means it is home for all the religions such as Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, Buddhism.

The official currency of India is called to Rupees. And the life expectancy for men is 67 years, and for women it’s 70 years. There are more than 20 official languages including Hindi and English. Currently Narender Modi is the Prime Minister of India. What I have noticed from my observation he loves travelling I’m not saying it went to like many countries which is good but sometimes it’s too much of travelling. So moving on let’s talk about geography of India.

Geography

India is the seventh largest country in the world when it comes to area. It lies in the northern portion of Indo Australian plate. India is surrounded by three water bodies which can be easily recognised by looking at the world map.

India covers an area of about 3,280,000 km² . The tropic of Cancer divides India into 2 halves. The total coastline length of India is about 7517 km. But basically as the world knows India is divided into two parts north India and South India also there are memes trending on Facebook right now regarding North Indians versus South Indians. I am a north Indian so I support North Indians hahaha just kidding. In north India there are great Himalayan mountains. So let’s talk about the great mountains of north.

Northern Mountains

In the northern part of India there are Himalayas in the North as well as in the North Eastern region, they separate the country from Tibetan Plateau. The Himalaya region itself consists of three parallel ranges-

Himadri or Greater Himalyas - it is the most continuous range of mountains with the peaks covered with snow and are a source of famous Glacier like Siachen Glacier, the Gangotri and Yamunotri.
Himachal - this region contains great valleys like Kashmir Valley, Kangra valley, Kullu Vally. These places a great attraction to tourist. You will find mountains covered with snow in these areas. Although there is a little conflict going on in Kashmir have you talk about that later let’s just continue with the geographical facts.
Shivaliks or Outer Himalayas- this region of Mountain bed is extended through Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan and India of course. All of these three ranges can be further divided into different small ranges but I don’t want to complicate things so let’s just keep it simple and keep rolling ahead

Rivers

the rivers in India play an important role in life of Indians. The rivers provide transportation electricity food and water to the people of India this is the main reason why some major cities of India are located near rivers. The rivers also play important role in Hindu religion as they are considered holy by Hindus in the country Ganga river is a great example people worship in Ganga River and its water is considered as holy.
Based on the source we can divide Indian river system into two major systems-

The Himalayan river system
The Peninsular river system

The Himalayan River System

the Himalayan river system basically contains four rivers the Indus River, the Ganga river, the Yamuna River, the Bharamputra river. The Himalayan rivers mainly originate from the mountains of Himalayas and flow through the northern plains.
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The Indus River- it is one of the longest rivers in Asia. It originates from the Tibetan Plateau in China, the river runs a course through the Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir through India goes to Pakistan and flows along the entire length of Pakistan at the end merging into Arabian Sea near the port of Karachi. The river has a total drainage area exceeding 1,165,000 km².
The estimated annual flow volume is around 243 km cube. Twice that of Nile River. You may have heard of the Indus Valley civilisation some major cities in past such as Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, around 3300 BC were established near Indus River. We have found some largest human habitations of the ancient world near Indus River. The Indus Valley civilisation extend from across north-eastern Afghanistan to Pakistan and north-west India. Over the years many factories established near the bank of Indus River due to which pollution in the river has been increased. High level of pollution in the river led to the death of endangered Indus River Dolphin.
The Ganga River- the Ganga river flows through India and Bangladesh but mostly close from India the total length of river is 2525 km. It rises from the eastern Himalayas in the state of Uttarakhand, flows through northern India towards the Eastern side and eventually enters Bay of Bengal. The Ganga is one of the most religious rivers to Hindus it is a lifeline to millions of people who live along its way. The Ganga river is worshipped in Hinduism as the goddess Ganga. But the sad thing is the Ganga is highly populated today the pollution not only threatens human but they river species itself there are more than 140 fish species.
I have never been in the Ganga river but from my observation after seeing some documentaries and watching some TV shows about the I know it’s very polluted. The major cause of pollution in the Ganga is Humans. The level of Fecal Coliform bacteria is more than hundred times the official limit set by Indian government near the city of Varanasi. The Ganga action plan, an environmental initiative to clean up the Ganga river, has been the major failure so far mainly because of corruption and lack of technical support poor planning, and lack of support from religious authorities. Many people dive into Ganga river because it is assumed that by taking a dip in Ganga you can wash away all your bad Karmas. I will later talk about the Kumbh festival which happens near the shore of Ganga.
The Yamuna River- the Yamuna also known as Jumna, is longest the second largest tributary river of the Ganga in northern India. It originates from Yamunotri they share at a height of 6387 m on the south-western slopes of the lower Himalayas in Uttarakhand. It crosses several states like Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Uttar Pardesh and Delhi, Nearly 57 million people are dependent on Yamuna. To be honest it is also suffering from pollution and the Delhi the capital of India is the major reason behind the pollution in the Yamuna that’s what I think. Yamuna is also one of the most polluted rivers in India. Yamuna has five segments the Himalayan segment, upper segment, Delhi Segment, Eutriphicated segment, Yamuna is most polluted in its Delhi segment, the river enters Delhi from Palla village. 22 drains fall into Yamuna.
The lack of sufficient number of water treatment plants is also a reason behind the pollution problem in Yamuna. The last two decades almost $ 1 billion has been spent to clean the river. According to the latest report from the Central pollution control Board to pollution stretch of Yamuna has increased from 500 km to 600 km. Now you can estimate how big the corruption problem is in India. Every plan to clean the Yamuna River has not worked so far the river is still very polluted and the pollution is increasing day by day. The most sewage treatment facilities are either unfunded or more functioning property. Also the river is almost stagnant for about nine months it gets fresh water from rain. People also have to take responsibility and not to throw waste into the river for the sake of religious practices of whatever.
The Brahamputra river- The Bharamputra river is one of the major rivers in Asia it flows from China through India and Bangladesh. It originates from Angsi glacier, located on the northern side of Himalayas in Tibet, it flows through this out in Tibet to break through the Himalayas, through the Assam Valley it flows in the south-west direction at the end it merges into the Padma River in Bangladesh. Padma river is actually Ganga river but in Bangladesh people call Ganga river as Padma River.
It is about 3848 km long, The Bharamputra river is for irrigation and transportation mainly the average depth of the river is around 38 m and the maximum depth of the river is 120 m. It sometimes cause floods in some areas when the Himalayan snow melts it results in overflow of the river causing floods in some areas. The average discharge of River is about 19,800 m cube per second. The Ganga Brahmaputra system has the third great test average discharge of the world’s rivers.

The Peninsular river system

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Mahanadi- the word Mahanadi is made up from Sanskrit word Maha which means big or great and the word nadi which means river. The Mahanadi is a major river in east central India. Drains an area of about 141,600 km². It flows through state Chhattisgarh and Orissa. The length of the Mahanadi river is about 858 km.
We can’t really distinguish the origination of Mahanadi river as it is a combination of many small streams coming from mountains turning into a big river. So basically Mahanadi is the river made from a combination of many small rivers. Mahanadi is a very important river in the state of Odisha because there are many farmers in Odisha and their lives depend on water from this river. Mahanadi is also responsible for drastic floods that happened earlier in 2008 and in 2011.
Godavari- Godavari is the second longest river in India after Ganga it flows through states like Maharashtra, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Pondicherry and Odisha. Godavari is also known as Ganga of South. The length of Godavari river is about 1465 km and it discharge rate is equal to 3505 m cube per second.
It originates from the Western Ghats of central India in Maharashtra which is approximately 80 km from the Arabian Sea. Then it flows eastwards across the Deccan Plateau then it turns towards south-east and enters Andhra Pradesh finally splitting into two distributaries forming a river delta and merging into Bay of Bengal. It covers a total area of around 312,812 km².
Krishna River- the Krishna river is the fourth biggest river in terms of water inflow and river basin area in India. Ganga holds the first position followed by Godavari and Brahmaputra. It flows through states like Maharashtra, Karnataka, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
The length of Krishna river is about 1300 km. Actually Krishna is the name of god in Hinduism so the river derived it’s name from the god Krishna. The Krishna river also originates from western cards and similar to Godavari river it & Bay of Bengal. Krishna basin extend over an area of 258,948 km². Mostly Krishna river’s water is consumed entirely before it joins the sea and a major portion of that water is used in agriculture. Though it receives pollution from number of big cities.

Festivals

India is also known as Land of festivals. India is a secular country that means different religions coexist harmoniously. India is rich in its culture and festivals there are many festivals that are celebrated in India but I will only discuss three of them which are like the main ones I think. The first one is Holi the festival of colours, Diwali the festival of lights, and Kumbha mela actually Kumbh mela a bit different than other festivals that are celebrated in India for sure there are a lot more festivals that are celebrated and also there are regional festivals that people of different states celebrate but let’s just discuss these three.
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Holi

Also known as festival of colour, Holi is celebrated all across India and by chance I’m writing this blog on the occasion of holi itself. Holi is a festival that signifies the victory of good over evil. This festival comes in the spring time at the end of winter on this day people meet, greet and apply colours on each other it’s somewhat similar to Thanksgiving celebrated in western side but it’s different in many ways. I personally love this festival because the first reason is my mom makes tasty food on this day and also me and my friends team up to apply colours on the faces of people throw water on them it’s very funny. One thing I like about Holi is anyone and everyone is in fair game, friend or stranger, rich or poor, man or woman, children or elder everyone celebrates holy with full joy. It brings people together
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Diwali

Diwali also known as the Festival of lights is a Hindu festival that is celebrated all over India , it comes in the period of autumn for northern hemisphere and for the South and Hemisphere it falls in the spring season. Diwali also known as Deepavli it is a cultural festival. On this day people decorate their houses do shopping and firework, They also pray to the Goddess Laxmi on this day. People gift presents to each other, feast and sweets etc. It is one of the most important festival in Hinduism it signifies the victory of light over darkness or the victory of good over evil. It is celebrated by using millions of lights shining outside doors and temples. Even its observable from the space with all those lights. Before Diwali people usually decorate, clean, wash and paint their houses.

I personally love this festival because there are many relatives that visit us and everyone is well dressed up on this day. Also I get to eat sweets tons of sweets actually. It's kind of awesome environment at night of the Diwali fireworks in the sky each house lights up Diwali is full of energy. But I also want to mention about the pollution caused by firecrackers on this day, although this time the Supreme Court ordered ban on firecrackers in the national capital Delhi but there are people using firecrackers even in Delhi.

The place where I live is not that polluted but at night many children blew a ton of firecrackers near my house leaving the cloud of smoke in the morning when I went out I saw the amount of burnt firecrackers waste lying on the street which is bad I know but it is what it is. When I was a kid I also used to blew firecrackers on this day But now I got a little brain inside my head which understands that this thing is wrong and should be stopped. When Diwali comes pollution level spikes in major Indian cities. And it is fact that air pollution is the greatest contributor of pollution -related deaths globally and the harsh reality is India and China account the largest number of deaths that happen due to pollution with India at an estimate of about 2.5 million people.

Talking about Delhi specifically as its the National capital of India Also one of the most polluted cities in the world there have been many approaches taken by the government to stop pollution in Delhi. One of the most weird was the odd-even rule that means you can take your car away but the last digit of the number plate must be even on the next day however the last digit of number plate should be odd but this plan failed. Air pollution is a community problem people have to understand that also the ban on the sale of fireworks in Delhi turned out to be failed as the city was completely covered in smog the day after the Diwali. Alright I think talked a lot about Diwali let's move onto the next festival the Kumbh Mela.
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Kumbh Mela

The Kumbh Mela is inscribed on the UNESCO's representative list of intangible cultural heritage of humanity is such a big festival I mean it's not celebrated all over the India but people from all over the India gather at one place to celebrate this festival and the amount of people gather at a place such incredible that it can be seen through space large number of Hindu people gather to take bath in holy river as I mentioned earlier it is believed that taking part in the river means to clean all the sins. But the thing is this festival is celebrated only once in 12 years so that's nice actually because if Kumbh Mela occurs Every year than I can't imagine how polluted will be the river. That's it for for festivals I guess I don't want to make this post very long because I know most of the people by most I mean everyone isn't going to read all this I just want to share this so that maybe someday it appears on someone's Google search and that person might read it.

Okay let's finish this blog right here I will list all the references below and please let me know about the drawings I made them by myself and if you want to use them anywhere you are free to use. Thank you for stopping by and I hope you have a great day, thank you very much

Culture and geography of India