A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c7.32

c7.32

The Tapti (436 miles in length), rising on the Satpura plateau near Multai, flows through a straight and steep-sided valley, locally opening out to form wide alluvial plains, to the Gulf of Cambay which it joins by an estuary. Its banks are too high (30 to 60 feet) for the water to be used for irrigation while the frequent rocky ridges crossing the river render navigation impossible except for the last 20 miles of its course. The Khandesh plain in the middle Tapti valley is the most northern section of the Deccan; stretching for 150 miles east to west it is an extensive area of rich alluvial black soil, a land of large and prosperous towns. Physically it merges eastward into the Nagpur plain characterized by the same type of land use. The rugged hilly and forested regions adjoining the river were breeding-grounds for wild elephants until about the seventeenth century.