Map Work

How map questions are asked

• Both questions use the same outline map, printed at the end of the question paper. Follow the invigilator's instructions for attaching it to your answer book.
• The numbers here are the sample paper's. The Geography map was Q18 in May 2026 and the whole map question was Q37 in 2025, so go by the printed number and section heading.
• Clues usually describe the place instead of naming it: "the place where Gandhiji broke the Salt Law", "the nuclear power plant in Maharashtra", "the major dam on the Chenab river", "an international airport in Punjab". So learn every item with its state, and with its river or event.
• The curriculum adds that items for locating and labelling may also be given for identification. The reverse happens too in board practice: the leading jute state (2025) and the leading tea state (May 2026) are "Identify" items on the list but were set as locate-and-label. So the "Ask" column below is the curriculum's label, not a limit: prepare every item both ways.
• Visually impaired candidates get "Name the place where…" questions instead, answered in the answer book. The places can differ: in the sample paper the map asked for Amritsar and Champaran, while the visually impaired version asked for Dandi and Ahmedabad.

The History map list (Nationalism in India)

• Every board paper had a Salt March clue and a Congress-session clue, but the words did not always settle the place:
• 2025: "The place where the session of Indian National Congress was held in 1920" (Calcutta or Nagpur) and "The place where Gandhiji started Dandi March" (the march actually began at Sabarmati, Ahmedabad, and ended at Dandi).
• February 2026: "The place where Gandhiji broke the Salt Law" and "The place where the session of Indian National Congress was held", with no year.
• May 2026: the Congress session (Madras, 1927, as the visually impaired version says) and "the place where Gandhiji broke the Salt Law".
• The sample paper used Amritsar and Champaran instead.
• When a clue fits two places, the marked dot decides. Calcutta is in the east, Nagpur in the centre of India. Dandi is on the coast; Ahmedabad is inland.
• Kheda, Ahmedabad and Dandi are all in Gujarat. Dandi is on the coast south of Surat; Ahmedabad and Kheda are inland, close to each other.
• Older guide books also list Chauri Chaura. It is not in the 2026-27 list.

The Geography map list

Chapter 1, Resources and Development. Identify the major soil types: alluvial, black, red and yellow, laterite, arid and forest soils.

Chapter 3, Water Resources. Locate and label these dams:

Chapter 4, Agriculture. Identify the major areas of rice and wheat, and the largest or major producer states of sugarcane, tea, coffee, rubber, cotton and jute. The states to know first: sugarcane, Uttar Pradesh; tea, Assam; coffee, Karnataka; rubber, Kerala; jute, West Bengal; cotton, Gujarat and Maharashtra. For rice and wheat, learn the major areas from your textbook's maps. The board asked for the leading jute state in 2025 and the leading tea state in May 2026.

Chapter 5, Minerals and Energy Resources:

Chapter 6, Manufacturing Industries:

Chapter 7, Lifelines of National Economy (only these map items are in the board exam):

That is 65 places plus the soils and crop areas. It looks long, but many repeat: Mumbai appears as a cotton centre, a software park, a port and an airport.

Symbols and neat labelling

The question asks for "suitable symbols"; it does not fix them. Use one simple symbol for each kind of place and keep it the same every time. The answer maps in this course's sample papers use: a small triangle for a dam, a star for a power plant, a square for an industry, an anchor for a port, an aeroplane for an airport, and a small circle for other places. For a state (a leading crop state or a soil region), put the symbol well inside it and write the name beside it; light shading with slanting pencil lines also works.

1. Put the symbol exactly on the spot, not "somewhere in the state". Coastal places (ports, Dandi, Tarapur, Kalpakkam) go on the coastline, not inland and not out at sea; Mumbai High and Bassein go in the sea off Mumbai.
2. Write the name right beside the symbol, level and readable, not across a boundary or over the symbol. For Q9, write the names on the lines drawn near A and B, as the question asks.
3. Write the item number with each label, such as "(ii) Tarapur", so the examiner can see which three items you chose.
4. Use a sharp pencil or a fine pen. A thick blot can cover two places at once.
5. In "any three of four", do only three. Choose the three you are surest of in the reading time.

Where students lose map marks

• A symbol with no name, or a name with no symbol. No scheme spells out the split, so to be safe, give both.
• The right state, the wrong spot. Tarapur is on the coast north of Mumbai; Kakrapara is in southern Gujarat, inland; Kalpakkam is on the coast south of Chennai.
• Look-alike names: Salal (dam, Jammu and Kashmir) and Salem (steel, Tamil Nadu); Narora (nuclear, Uttar Pradesh) and Namrup (thermal, Assam); Kakrapara and Kalpakkam (both nuclear); Durg (iron ore, Chhattisgarh) and Durgapur (steel, West Bengal); Rana Pratap Sagar and Sardar Sarovar.
• States with more than one item. Jharkhand has two steel plants, Jamshedpur and Bokaro, and the 2025 paper asked simply for "an iron and steel plant located in Jharkhand". Mark one of them clearly and name it. Gujarat and Tamil Nadu have many items on the lists, so read the clue to the end.
• Answering the visually impaired version when you are not a visually impaired candidate. Those questions are only for them.

How to practise

• Get 15-20 blank political outline maps of India, the same kind the board uses.
• Learn one group at a time (History places, dams, power plants, industries, ports and airports), then mix them.
• From November, spend 10 minutes a day: mark five random items from memory, then check them against your atlas or textbook map.
• Make clue cards in the board's style: "Nuclear power plant in Gujarat → Kakrapara", "Dam on the Chenab → Salal".
• Practise with this course: the Map Work section of Geography: Important Questions and Answers has map items with answers, and Q9 and Q19 of every sample paper use different places from the lists, with the correct positions shown in the Detailed Solutions.