Which of the following Indian rivers does not form a delta at its mouth?
- A.Mahanadi
- B.Godavari
- C.Narmada
- D.Krishna
Correct answer
Explanation
The correct answer is C, the Narmada. It flows west through the narrow rift between the Vindhya and the Satpura ranges and opens into the Gulf of Khambhat, where strong tides sweep away the silt, so the river ends in a funnel shaped estuary and not a delta; the Tapi, which also flows west in a rift, behaves the same way. Option A is wrong because the Mahanadi builds a delta on the Odisha coast near Chilika. Option B is wrong because the Godavari delta, with the Krishna delta beside it, forms the broad fertile tract of coastal Andhra Pradesh. Option D is wrong for the same reason, as the Krishna delta is one of the large east coast deltas. Remember the rule of thumb: the east flowing peninsular rivers build deltas because they flow down a gentle slope into a shallow sea, while the west flowing Narmada and Tapi, confined by faults, cannot.
Read the full article: Drainage Patterns and River Basins of India: GK Notes
Practice Questions
View allThe drainage pattern in which the tributaries of a river look like the branches of a tree is called
- A.Radial
- B.Dendritic
- C.Centripetal
- D.Trellis
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The word comes from the Greek for tree, and the pattern develops where the underlying rock is of uniform hardness and the slope is gentle, so the streams branch freely without being guided by lines of weakness; the tributaries of the Ganga in the northern plain are the standard Indian…
Read the full explanation →The Narmada, the Son and the Mahanadi flowing out in different directions from the Amarkantak plateau is an example of which drainage pattern?
- A.Radial
- B.Rectangular
- C.Parallel
- D.Deranged
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In a radial pattern the streams start from a dome, a volcanic cone or a high plateau and run outward in all directions like the spokes of a wheel.
Read the full explanation →Which is the largest river basin of India by area?
- A.Godavari basin
- B.Indus basin
- C.Ganga basin
- D.Brahmaputra basin
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The correct answer is C, the Ganga basin, which covers about 8.6 lakh square kilometres inside India, close to a quarter of the country, and takes in parts of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Delhi.
Read the full explanation →Which river of peninsular India is known as the Dakshin Ganga and has the largest basin in the peninsula?
- A.Krishna
- B.Godavari
- C.Mahanadi
- D.Cauvery
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It rises at Trimbakeshwar in Nashik district of Maharashtra, runs about one thousand four hundred kilometres across Maharashtra, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh to the Bay of Bengal, and drains about 3.1 lakh square kilometres, the largest catchment in the peninsula, which is why it is called the Ganga of the…
Read the full explanation →Centripetal drainage, in which streams flow inward from all sides, is best illustrated in India by the streams draining into
- A.Chilika lake
- B.Wular lake
- C.Loktak lake
- D.Sambhar lake
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Loktak lies in the floor of the Manipur valley, which is ringed by hills, so the streams of the valley run inward into it from every side, the classic shape of a centripetal pattern; the lake is also known for its floating phumdis and for Keibul Lamjao, the only floating…
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