One village in Meghalaya gets more rain in a year than most deserts see in a century. Locals cross rivers there on bridges grown from living tree roots.
✊ Must Know
Basics: Capital, Formation, Leadership
- Meghalaya’s capital is Shillong.
- The state was formed on 21 January 1972, carved out of Assam.
- As of 2026, the Chief Minister is Conrad Sangma, of the National People’s Party. He first took office in 2018, and began his current term on 7 March 2023.
- The Governor is C.H. Vijayashankar.
📘 Good to Know
Geography and the Wettest Place on Earth
- Meghalaya lies in northeastern India, covering about 22,429 square kilometres.
- It borders Assam to the north and east, and shares an international border with Bangladesh to the south and west.
- The state’s name means “Abode of Clouds” in Sanskrit.
- Its terrain is dominated by three hill ranges: the Garo Hills in the west, and the Khasi and Jaintia Hills in the centre and east.
- The village of Mawsynram, in the East Khasi Hills, is widely recorded as the wettest inhabited place on Earth. See IndGeo0063 — Cherrapunji and Mawsynram for more.
Test Yourself
🌟 Great to Know
Matrilineal Society and Living Root Bridges
- The Khasi people practise a matrilineal system. Property passes down through the youngest daughter, not through sons.
- Communities in the Khasi Hills grow living root bridges, trained by hand from the roots of rubber trees. Some have stood for over 500 years.
- Nearby Cherrapunji once held the title of wettest place on Earth, before Mawsynram overtook it. Both towns still hold Guinness World Records for extreme rainfall.
- Meghalaya’s hill terrain and heavy rainfall together shape almost everything distinctive about the state, from its architecture to its farming patterns.
- Umiam, near Shillong, hosts NESAC (North Eastern Space Applications Centre), ISRO‘s regional space applications base for the whole Northeast.
📝 Previous Year Questions
Where Living Root Bridges Grow
- The technique Local communities train the roots of living trees, mainly rubber fig (Ficus elastica), into robust bridges across streams. The bridges grow stronger over decades.
- Builders The Khasi and Jaintia peoples build them, mostly in East Khasi Hills and West Jaintia Hills districts.
- Answer: (a) Meghalaya.
- View this question on the full 2015 paper →
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