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The word Maharashtra, the land of the Marathi speaking
people, appears to be derived from Maharashtri, an old form of Prakrit.
Some believe that the word indicates that it was the land of the Mahars
and the Rattas, while others consider it to be a corruption of the term
'Maha Kantara' (the Great Forest), a synonym for 'Dandakaranya'.
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Located in the north centre of Peninsular India,
with a command of the Arabian Sea through its port of Mumbai,
Maharashtra has a remarkable physical homogeneity, enforced by
its underlying geology. The dominant physical trait of the state
is its plateau character. The Maharashtra Desh is a plateau of
plateaux, its western upturned rims rising to form the Sahyadri
Range and its slopes gently descending towards the east and southeast.
The major rivers and their master tributaries have carved the
plateaux into alternating broad-river valleys and intervening
higher lever interfluves, such as the Ahmednagar, Buldana, and
Yavatmal plateaux.
The Sahyadri Range is the physical backbone of
Maharashtra. Rising on an average to an elevation of 1000m. it
falls in steep cliffs, to the Konkan on the west. Eastwards, the
hill country falls in steps through a transitional area known
as Mawal to the plateau level. The series of crowning plateaux
on the crest forms a distinctive feature of the Sahyadri Range.
The Konkan, lying between the Arabian Sea and
the Sahyadri Range is narrow coastal lowland, barely 50 km. wide.
Though mostly below 200 m., it is far from being a plain country.
Highly dissected and broken, the Konkan alternates between narrow,
steep-sided valleys and low laterite plateaux.
The Satpudas, hills along the northern border,
and the Bhamragad-Chiroli-Gaikhuri Ranges on the eastern border
form physical barriers preventing easy movement, but also serve
as natural limits to the state.
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Except around Mumbai, and along the eastern
limits, the State of Maharashtra presents a monotonously uniform,
flat-topped skyline. This topography of the state is the outcome
of its geological structure. The state area, barring the extreme
eastern Vidarbha region, parts of Kolhapur and Sindhudurg, is
practically co-terminous with the Deccan Traps. Roughly 60 to
90 million years ago, the outpouring of basic lava through fissures
formed horizontally bedded basalt over large areas. Variations
in their composition and structure have resulted in massive, well-jointed
steel-grey cliff faces alternating with structural benches of
vesicular amygdaloid lava and ash layers, all of which contribute
to the pyramida-shaped hills and crest-level plateaux or mesas.
Earth sculpturing under the tropical climate completed the panorama-sharply
defining the landform features in the semi-arid conditions, and
rounding the hilltops under wetter condition. Fluvial action by
the Krishna, Bhima, Godavari, Tapi-Purna and Wardha-Wainganga
river systems has further aided in the compartmentalisation of
the Desh into broad, open river valleys, alternating with plateau
interfluves, that form the ribs of the Sahyadrian backbone. In
sharp contrast, the hill torrents of the Konkan, barely a 100
km. long, tumble down as roaring streams which flow in deeply
entrenched valleys to terminate in tidal estuaries.
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The state enjoys a tropical monsoon climate; the hot scorching
summer from March onwards yields to the rainy monsoon in early
June. The rich green cover of the monsoon season persists during
the mild winter that follows through an unpleasant October transition,
but turns into a dusty, barren brown as the summer sets in again.
The seasonal rains from the western sea-clouds are very heavy
and the rainfall is over 400 cm., on the Sahyadrian crests. The
Konkan on the windward side is also endowed with heavy rainfall,
declining northwards. East of the Sahyadri, the rainfall diminishes
to a meagre 70 cm. in the western plateau districts, with Solapur-Ahmednagar
lying in the heart of the dry zone. The rains increase slightly,
later in the season, eastwards in the Marathwada and Vidarbha
regions.
The highly pulsatory character of the monsoon, with its short
spells of rainy weather and long dry breaks, floods, as well as
droughts add much to the discomfort of the rural economy.
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Forests comprising only 17% of the state area
cover the eastern region and the Sahyadri Range, while open scrub
jungle dots the plateaux. If Maharashtra represented the Maha
Kantara in the historic past, today little of it is left; vast
sections have been denuded and stripped of the vegetal cover.
The soils of Maharashtra are residual, derived
from the underlying basalts. In the semi-dry plateau, the regur
(black-cotton soil) is clayey, rich in iron, but poor in nitrogen
and organic matter; it is moisture-retentive. Where redeposited
along the river valleys, those kali soils are deeper and heavier,
better suited for rabi crops. Farther away, with a better mixture
of lime, the morand soils form the ideal Kharif zone. The higher
plateau areas have pather soils, which contain more gravel. In
the rainy Konkan, and the Sahyadri Range, the same basalts give
rise to the brick-red laterites productive under a forest-cover,
but readily stripped into a sterile varkas when the vegetation
is removed. By and large, soils of Maharashtra are shallow and
somewhat poor.
Water is the most precious natural resource of
the state, greatly in the demand, and most unevenly distributed.
A large number of villages lack drinking water, especially during
the summer months, even in the wet Konkan. Barely 11% of the net
sown area is irrigated. Perched water tables in the basalt aquifers
have contributed to increased well irrigation, which accounts
for approximately 55% of the irrigable water. The granitic-gneissic
terrain in the eastern hilly area of Vidarbha accounts for all
tank irrigation. Tube-wells in the Tapi-Purna alluvium and shallow
wells in the coastal sands are the other main sources of water.
The mineral-bearing zones of Maharashtra lie
beyond the area of the basalts in eastern Vidarbha, southern Kolhapur
and the Sindhudurg area. The Chandrapur, Gadchirali, Bhandara
and Nagpur Districts form the main mineral belt, with coal and
manganese as the major minerals and iron ore and limestone as
potential wealth. The Ratnagiri coast contains sizeable deposits
of illimenite.
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