Indian Peninsular Plateau (Deccan Plateau)

• A plateau is raised land with a flat top, rising sharply above its surroundings on at least one side. Plateaus often stand alone, with no other plateau around them.
• The Peninsular Plateau is the largest physiographic unit of India and one of the oldest landforms on earth: a stable block of ancient rock, broken into smaller plateaus, hill ranges and river basins.

Character of the Plateau

Features of the Peninsular Plateau

• Shape: roughly triangular. Its base lies along the southern margin of the northern plain, and its apex is at Kanniyakumari.
• Limits: hill ranges bound it on all three sides.
  • North: the Aravali, Vindhya, Satpura, Bharner and Rajmahal ranges.
  • South of about 22°N: the Western Ghats (Sahyadri) on the west and the Eastern Ghats on the east.
  • Its northern line wanders from Kachchh up the west side of the Aravali towards Delhi, then keeps near the Yamuna and Ganga, ending at the Rajmahal Hills and the delta.
• Size: about 16 lakh sq km, about half of India’s roughly 32 lakh sq km (32.87 lakh sq km by the current official figure). It spans about 1,600 km north to south and 1,400 km east to west.
• Height: an average of 600–900 m, varying by region, with many parts above 1,000 m.
• Slope: most Peninsular rivers run west to east, which reveals the general tilt.
  • The Narmada and Tapi are the exception, flowing east to west in a rift. A rift forms where the crust is pulled apart, as at a divergent plate boundary.
• Structure: one of the oldest landforms on earth, a highly stable block built largely from Archaean gneiss and schist.
  • As a shield, it has changed little in structure since it formed.
  • For several hundred million years it has stayed a land area. The sea reached it only locally and briefly, at a few places.
• Composition: an aggregation of smaller plateaus and hill ranges, with river basins and valleys between them.

Significance of the Plateau

• Minerals: the oldest and most stable landmass of the subcontinent is rich in metals (iron, manganese, copper, bauxite, chromium, gold) and mica, and it also yields slate, shale, sandstone and marble.
  • The Gondwana basins of the Peninsula hold over 99% of India’s coal.
• Soil and crops: the fertile black lava soil of the north-west suits cotton. Elsewhere the crops are plantation and dry-land ones, such as tea, coffee, rubber, spices, millets, oilseeds and tobacco. Rice grows in the low tracts, and tropical fruit is widespread.
• Forests: the highlands carry varied forests and forest products.
• Water: rivers from the Western Ghats offer hydroelectricity and irrigation.
• Hill resorts: Udagamandalam (Ooty), Pachmarhi, Kodaikanal, Mahabaleshwar, Khandala, Matheran and Mount Abu.

Minor Plateaus in the Peninsular Plateau

• These second-order regions fall into two broad groups: the Central Highlands north of the Narmada-Son trough, and the Deccan Plateau south of it. The eastern plateaus and the Meghalaya block are often treated separately.

• In this sketch the Shillong Plateau sits inside the “Central Highland” box only for convenience. It is a detached block in the north-east.

Marwar Plateau or Mewar Plateau

• The plateau of eastern Rajasthan, east of the Aravali.
  • The Marwar plain lies west of the Aravali. The upland to the east is called the Marwar Upland in many accounts, though the map below shows that this tract is historically Mewar.
• Height: 250–500 m, sloping down eastward.
• Rocks: sandstone, shale and limestone of the Vindhyan period.
• Rivers: the Banas, with its tributaries the Berach and Khari, rises in the Aravali and joins the Chambal after about 400–500 km. It runs north-east, not north-west as sometimes written.
  • Their erosion makes the plateau top look like a rolling plain.
    • A rolling plain is not fully flat. It has slight rises and falls, as in the Prairies of the USA.

Central Highland

• Known too as Madhya Bharat Pathar (Madhya Bharat Plateau), and lying east of the Marwar or Mewar Upland.
• Most of it is the basin of the Chambal, whose valley is described as lying in a rift.
• Main tributaries:
  • The Kali Sindh, which rises in the Vindhyan upland of Madhya Pradesh. Older accounts have it “flowing from Rana Pratap Sagar”, but that reservoir stands on the Chambal itself.
  • The Banas, through the Mewar plateau.
  • The Parwan and Parbati, from Madhya Pradesh, along with the Sindh.
• It is a rolling plateau of old rocks, with rounded sandstone hills and thick forest.
• North of it the Chambal has carved its typical ravines or badlands.

Bundelkhand Upland

• Limits: the Yamuna to the north, Madhya Bharat Pathar to the west, the Vindhyan Scarplands to the east and south-east, and the Malwa Plateau to the south.
• An old dissected upland (cut by many deep valleys) of Bundelkhand gneiss, meaning granite and gneiss.
• Extent: about 54,560 sq km over nine districts: five in Uttar Pradesh (Banda, Hamirpur, Jalaun, Jhansi, Lalitpur) and four in Madhya Pradesh (Chhatarpur, Datia, Panna, Tikamgarh).
  • Alluvium covers its north-western and north-eastern edges, and the Deccan Trap its south-west.
• Height: 300–600 m, sloping from the Vindhyan Scarp to the Yamuna.
• Relief: a chain of hillocks of granite and sandstone.
  • River erosion has left an undulating, wave-like surface, unfit for cultivation.
  • The topography is senile, a sign of old age in the landscape.
• Rivers: the Betwa, Dhasan and Ken flow through it, in gorges with rocky banks and waterfalls.

• The red line on this map marks the Ken-Betwa Link, the first project of the national river-linking plan to reach implementation.
  • It takes water from the Ken to the Betwa through the Daudhan Dam, 96.7 m high, on the Ken in Panna and Chhatarpur.
  • The Union Cabinet approved it on 8 December 2021, and the foundation stone was laid on 25 December 2024. Completion is scheduled for 2030, so the word “proposed” on the map is out of date.
  • It needs 5,578.92 hectares of forest land inside the Panna Tiger Reserve, the project’s main ecological concern.

Malwa Plateau

• It forms a rough triangle based on the Vindhyan Hills, with the Aravali to the west, Madhya Bharat Pathar to the north and Bundelkhand to the east, the last marked by a sharp scarp.
• Size: about 530 km by 390 km, about 1.5 lakh sq km.
• Two drainage systems:
  • To the Arabian Sea: the Narmada, Tapi and Mahi.
  • To the Bay of Bengal: the Chambal and Betwa, joining the Yamuna.
• In the north the Chambal and its right-bank tributaries, the Kali, Sindh and Parbati, drain it. The upper Sindh, Ken and Betwa also start here.
• Rocks and soil: extensive lava flows covered with black soil.
  • The lavas are part of the Deccan Trap and began erupting about 66.8 million years ago, slightly before those of the Western Ghats. They now cover about 80,000 sq km.
• Slope: northward, falling from about 600 m to under 500 m.
• Surface: a rolling plateau with flat-topped hills, cut by rivers and marked by the Chambal ravines in the north.

• The blue patch on this small map follows Madhya Pradesh’s political outline, which is far larger than the Malwa Plateau itself. The Chota Nagpur patch likewise reaches too far north.

Baghelkhand

• It lies north and east of the Maikal Range, with the Son valley on its north.
• Rocks: limestone and sandstone in the west, granite in the east.
• Limits: the Son to the north; anticlinal highlands and synclinal valleys of sandstone and limestone to the south.
• Water divide: its central part separates the Son drainage in the north from the Mahanadi system in the south.
• Height: an uneven 150–1,200 m.
• The Bharner and Kaimur hills stand close to the axis of the Narmada-Son trough, and Vindhyan sandstone scarps lie between the Ganga plain and the trough.
• The nearly horizontal strata show that it has escaped major disturbance.

Rohtas Plateau

• Also called the Kaimur Plateau, in south-western Bihar.
• It covers about 800 square miles (2,100 sq km) of undulating tableland, reaching 450 m (1,490 feet) at Rohtasgarh.
• Setting: a series of descending fluvial plateaus runs along the Kaimur Range. From west to east they are Panna, Bhander, Rewa and Rohtas.

• “Calcutta” on this map is Kolkata.

Bhander Plateau

• A plateau of Madhya Pradesh, with an area of about 10,000 sq km.
• It links the Deccan Plateau to the south with the Indo-Gangetic Plains to the north and the Chota Nagpur Plateau to the east.
• It is part of the Vindhya Range in central India, and it is the second step in the Panna-Bhander-Rewa-Rohtas series.

Chotanagpur Plateau

• The Peninsula’s north-eastern projection, lying mostly in Jharkhand, with northern Chhattisgarh and Purulia district of West Bengal.
• Size: about 65,000 sq km for its three core plateaus (Ranchi, Hazaribagh and Kodarma), and over 87,000 sq km when the margins are counted.
• Average height: about 700 m. The Son flows along the north-west and joins the Ganga.
• Rocks: it is often said to be mainly Gondwana.
  • The plateau is in fact mainly Precambrian gneiss and granite, the Chhotanagpur Gneiss Complex.
  • Gondwana rocks occur in the faulted Damodar trough, and lava in the west, weathered to laterite and bauxite.
• Steps: a series of plateaus at different levels, falling outward from the pat lands (about 1,100 m) in the mid-west, with waterfalls at the breaks.
• Drainage: rivers leave in all directions, in a radial drainage pattern.
  • The Damodar, Subarnarekha, North Koel, South Koel and Barakar have large basins.
  • The Damodar runs through the middle, from west to east, in a rift valley, holding the Gondwana coalfields that provide the bulk of India’s coal.
• Hazaribagh Plateau: north of the Damodar, at about 600 m, with isolated hills. Parasnath rises to 1,366 m in the east. Large-scale erosion makes it look like a peneplain.
• Ranchi Plateau: south of the Damodar, at about 600 m, mostly a rolling surface on which Ranchi (661 m) stands.
  • Laterite-capped mesas rise in the west to about 1,100 m, with Netarhat Pat at 1,119 m and Gaur at 1,142 m.
  • It is broken at places by conical hills and monadnocks, isolated hills of resistant rock left standing above a peneplain, such as Uluru (Ayers Rock) in Australia.
• Rajmahal Hills: the north-eastern edge, mostly basalt covered by lava flows.
  • These lavas are about 118–115 million years old, so they are far older than the Deccan Trap, and they are linked in time with the Kerguelen plume.
  • They run north-south at an average 400 m (highest point 567 m) and are cut into separate plateaus.

Lava Plateau and Chota Nagpur Compared

Meghalaya Plateau

• The Peninsular block continues eastward beyond the Rajmahal Hills as the Meghalaya or Shillong Plateau, about 35,000 sq km.
• The Garo-Rajmahal Gap separates it from the main block.
  • The gap came from down-faulting: in a normal fault, one block of earth slides down. The Ganga and Brahmaputra then filled it with sediment.
  • Down-warping along the Rajmahal-Garo line forms the Malda Gap, through which the Ganga and Brahmaputra flow.
• Rocks: often summed up as Archaean quartzites, shales and schists.
  • More precisely, an Archaean gneissic basement carries the quartzites of the Proterozoic Shillong Group, with granite intrusions, Gondwana beds in the west, Sylhet Trap basalt in the south, and Cretaceous-Tertiary sediments along the southern edge.
• Why it counts as Peninsular: it shares the shield’s basement and its rigid block behaviour, and it stands apart from the folded Himalaya. Only the gap and its fill hide the link.
• Slopes: northward to the Brahmaputra valley and southward to the Surma and Meghna valleys. Its western edge roughly coincides with the Bangladesh border.
• Parts: the Garo Hills (900 m) in the west, Khasi-Jaintia Hills (1,500 m) in the centre, and Mikir Hills (700 m) in the east. The Mikir Hills lie in Assam, across the Kopili fault.
• Highest point: Shillong (1,961 m).

• This sketch covers the wider north-east. “Jointia” on it is Jaintia.

Deccan Plateau

• The biggest single unit of this block, at about 5 lakh sq km.
• Triangular, framed by the two Ghats on the west and east, by the Satpura and Vindhya on the north-west, and by the Mahadev and Maikal on the north.
• Average height: 600 m, rising to 1,000 m in the south and dipping to 500 m in the north.
• Slope: west to east, shown by the flow of the Mahanadi, Godavari, Krishna and Cauvery.
• These rivers have cut it into smaller plateaus.

• This map marks the basalt-covered Deccan and the older cratons around it, so its “Deccan Plateau” is narrower than the full triangle described above.

Maharashtra Plateau

• The Deccan’s northern part, within Maharashtra.
• Rocks: much of it rests on basalt of lava origin, and most of the Deccan Traps lie here.
• Weathering makes it look like a rolling plain.
• Horizontal lava sheets create the typical step-like Deccan Trap topography.
• Steep hills and ridges with flat tops line the wide, shallow valleys of the Godavari, Bhima and Krishna. The Ajanta range lies south of the Tapi.
• Black cotton soil, or regur, covers the whole area.

Karnataka Plateau

• Also called the Mysore Plateau, south of the Maharashtra plateau, and made mainly of Archaean formations.
• A rolling plateau averaging 600–900 m.
• Highly dissected by rivers from the Western Ghats. It holds the heads of the Tungabhadra and Cauvery.
• Hill lines either follow the trend of the Western Ghats or cut across it.
• Highest peak: Mullayanagiri (1,930 m) in the Baba Budan Hills of Chikkamagaluru district. The 1,913 m long quoted for Mulangiri is an older figure.
• Two parts:
  • Malnad, Kannada for “hill country”: deep valleys under dense forest.
  • Maidan: a rolling plain with low granite hills.
• In the south it tapers between the Western and Eastern Ghats and merges with the Nilgiri hills.

Telangana Plateau

• Made of Archaean gneisses, at an average 500–600 m, with the south higher than the north.
• Dharwar rocks occur within it and make it rich in minerals.
• Gondwana rocks occur in the Godavari valley, famous for coal.
• Rivers: the Godavari, Krishna and Penner.
• Two regions: the Ghats and the Peneplains.
  • A peneplain is a vast, nearly featureless, gently undulating surface, the final stage of a long cycle of erosion rather than of deposition.

Bastar Plateau

• Bastar is the southernmost region of Chhattisgarh, a forested, mineral-rich tract.
  • It lies between the Mahanadi and Godavari rivers and is cut in two by the Indravati.
• It is tribal-dominated.
• Naxalism: long described as being under the strong grip of Naxal violence, the region’s status changed in 2026.
  • After the review that followed the 31 March 2026 deadline, the Union Home Ministry stated that no district in India remains in the affected category.
  • The Bastar districts stay under the “Legacy and Thrust” label, which means continued security and development support.

• This map shows the old undivided Bastar. The name now covers a division of seven districts.

Chhattisgarh Plain

• The only true plain in the Peninsular plateau: a saucer-shaped hollow through which the upper Mahanadi flows.
• The Odisha hills enclose the basin on one side and the Maikala Range on the other.
• Name: the Haihaya (Haihayavanshi) rulers of Ratanpur, whose territory had thirty-six forts (Chhattisgarh). The form “Haithaivanshi” is a corruption.
• Rocks: nearly horizontal beds of limestone and shale of Cuddapah age.
• Height: about 330 m on the west side and 250 m on the east.

Dandakaranya Plateau

• A historical region mentioned in the Ramayana, in the Bastar region of present-day Chhattisgarh, in central India.
• As a physiographic unit it covers about 35,600 square miles (92,300 sq km), reaching from the Abujhmar Hills across to the Eastern Ghats.
  • Abujhmarh is a hilly forest area of Chhattisgarh, covering Narayanpur, Bijapur and Dantewada districts. It is home to the Gond, Muria, Abuj Maria and Halba tribes.
• It includes parts of Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
• It measures about 200 miles north to south and 300 miles east to west (about 320 km by 480 km).
• The Bailadila range in this region holds rich iron ore.

Hill Ranges of the Plateau

• The plateaus are separated by hill ranges and river valleys. These hills are far lower than the Himalaya: most are relict remnants of once higher hills, and a few are horsts. The chief ones in the list of mountain ranges are compared below, with the Western and Eastern Ghats among them.