India's position in Asia is strategic, surrounded by seas in eastern and western sides. The Himalayas in the North separates India from the rest of Asia.

Location: India lies between 8° 4' and 37° 6' north latitude and 68° 7' and 97° 25' east longitude. The boundaries of India are Arabian Sea in the Southwest, Bay of Bengal in the southeast, Himalayas in the north, and Indian Ocean in the south.

Extent: India stretches 3214 Km from north to south and 2933 Km from east to west with a total land area of 3,287,263 sq.km. It has a land frontier of 15,200 km and a coastline of 7516.5km. Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal and Lakshadweep in the Arabian Sea are parts of India.

Neighbours: Pakistan and Afghanistan on the west, Bangladesh and Burma on the east, share its political border with India. Palk Strait and the Gulf of Manner separates India from SriLanka. The Sinkiang Province of China, Tibet, Nepal and Bhutan share the northern boundary with India.

Mountain Range: There are seven ranges namely Himalayas, the Patkai and other ranges bordering India in the north and North east, the Vindyas separating Indo Gangetic plain from the Deccan Plateau, the Satpura, the Aravalli, the Sahyadri, covering the eastern side of the West Coast Plains and the Eastern Ghats, haphazardly scattered on the East Coast forming the boundary of the east coast plains.

Himalayas: being the highest mountain system in the world is also one of the youngest mountain ranges. It stretches for some 2500 km and covers an area of about 500,000 sq.km. It has the pride of having the highest mountain peak, Everest and some ten peaks rising above 7,500 m.

Patkai: also called Purvachal or Eastern Mountains, run along the Indo-Bangladesh Burma border. These include many small mountain ranges.

One of the oldest mountain ranges in the world is the Aravalli range. It lies in North-Western India. The present Aravalli is only a reminder of the mountain in the ancient age. It rises above the snowline, nourishing glaciers of amazing magnitude feeding many great rivers.

The Vindhyan range is formed with the scraps of the ancient Aravalli ranges. It traverses nearly the whole width of peninsular India distance of about 1050km with an average elevation of some 300 meters.

Another ancient mountain system which extends for a distance of 900km with many of its peak rising above 1000 meters is the Satpura range. It is triangular in nature with its tip at Ratnapuri and runs parallel to the Narmada and Tapti rivers.

Sahyadri also called Western Ghats runs 1200km along the western border of the Deccan Plateau from the river Tapti to Kanyakumari. Its proximity to the Arabian Sea makes it possible to absorb the Monsoon winds and give heavy rains to the western coast.

The powerful rivers fragment Eastern Ghats bordering the East Coast of India and so it is discontinuous. It rises up to 1000 meters between Godavari and Mahandi rivers.

The Desert region is divided into two. The larger one, the Thar desert extends from the edge of Rann of Kachchh further the river Luni northwards. The whole of Rajastan Sind Frontier runs through this. The smaller Desert extends from Luni between Jaislamer and Jodhpur up to northern wastes.

Rivers: the main rivers of India are the Indus, the Ganga, and the Brahamaputra. These rivers are both snow fed and river-fed and are perennial.

The Indus is the birthplace of many civilisations in India. The Aryans coined the word Sindhu, which was derived from Indus and given to India. Its tributaries are the Jhelum, the Chenab, Ravi, Beas, and Sutlej. The Indus takes its source from Mount Kailash in Tibet and runs many miles throughout he Himalayas and joins its tributaries in Punjab. Thereafter it joins with Pakistan and fall in to Arabian Sea.

The Ganga is considered as a sacred river by the Hindus. It's begins his journey in Gangotri in the Himalayas and passes through Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Bengal and mixes with the Bay of Bengal. Its tributaries are Gomti, Garga, Sarda, Gandak, Chambal, Son and Kosi. It covers all parts of India thus forming the largest river basin in India.

The Brahmaputra, rises in the western Tibet flows through the Himalayas for 1300 km then turns its way to south-west and then south joining the eastern most branch of Ganga -the Padma-and empties together with Ganga in to Bay of Bengal.

The major Deccan rivers are the Godavari, the Krishna, the Cauvery, the Penner, the Mahanadi, the Damodar, the Sharavathi, the Netravathi, the Bharatapuzha, the Periyar, the Pamba, the Narmada and Tapti.These rivers are totally rain-fed and therefore most of them become small streams in summer.