Lifelines of National Economy

This chapter explains how modern means of transport and communication act as the lifelines of the nation and its economy, tying together its supply and demand regions. It describes the different modes of transport in detail — roadways (India has the second-largest road network in the world) with their six classes; the railways, the principal mode of freight and passenger movement, reorganised into 17 zones; the newly arrived pipelines that carry crude oil, petroleum products and natural gas; the cheap and eco-friendly inland waterways and the National Waterways; the twelve major sea ports along the long coastline that handle most of India's foreign trade; and the fastest mode, airways, with schemes such as UDAN. It then covers communication — the world's largest postal network, the telecom network, and mass communication — and international trade, the balance of trade, and the growing role of tourism as a trade. It is a fact-rich and highly scoring chapter of the Class 10 Geography (Contemporary India II) Board syllabus.