Book review: National Atlas of India

Summary

This is a book review of the National Atlas of India (Preliminary Hindi Edition), published in 1957 under the directorship of Dr. S. P. Chatterjee. The review begins with a historical context of atlas production, noting that this atlas aims to systematically depict India's physical, economic, and cultural resources. It provides a detailed assessment of the atlas's contents, including maps at various scales (e.g., 1:6,000,000 and 1:10,000,000 for India) and inset maps. The review evaluates cartographic techniques, covering relief, drainage, rainfall, forest and land use, crop distribution, electric power, industry, and transport maps. It commends the atlas for its rich information and technical achievements while pointing out limitations such as color combinations and the effectiveness of dot-map techniques. Finally, it outlines the organization's future plans, including producing larger-scale population and settlement maps and ultimately compiling a complete atlas of 500 maps across 300 folio sheets.