Lakshadweep Islands (Physical Geography)

How big is Lakshadweep, really?

“Lakshadweep” means “a hundred thousand islands” in both Sanskrit and Malayalam, but the actual territory has just 36 islands. It is India’s smallest Union Territory, with a total land area of only about 32 square kilometres. Lakshadweep is a group of coral islands in the Arabian Sea, about 220 miles west of the Malabar Coast. Kavaratti is its capital, and one of only 10 inhabited islands out of the 36 total.

What does the archipelago actually contain?

The archipelago includes 12 atolls, 3 reefs, and 5 submerged banks, spread across roughly 30,000 square kilometres of sea. That huge sea area against just 32 sq km of land shows how little of this Union Territory sits above water. It is administered directly, with no district-level state government layer, and only around 65,000 people live here, making it India’s least populous Union Territory too.

How is Lakshadweep’s origin different from the Andaman Islands?

Lakshadweep’s islands formed from coral growth, not from a sunken mountain range, the key difference from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Charles Darwin’s subsidence theory explains how atolls like these typically form: a fringing reef grows around a volcanic island, then the island slowly sinks. The coral keeps growing upward as the island sinks, until only a ring-shaped reef around a lagoon remains, the volcanic peak long gone underwater.

What do the islands themselves look like?

The islands are flat, with no hills or rivers at all, and their highest point is only about 5 metres above sea level. Andrott, the largest island, is just 4.84 kilometres long. This flatness makes the islands unusually exposed to sea-level rise and storm surge, with almost no natural high ground to retreat to. Pitti, a tiny uninhabited coral islet, is kept deliberately free of people, protected as a bird and turtle nesting sanctuary.

What lies beneath Lakshadweep’s coral?

Lakshadweep sits on the Laccadive-Chagos Ridge, a submarine ridge that also carries the Maldives and the Chagos Archipelago further south. Geologists believe this ridge is the volcanic trace of the same Reunion hotspot that formed the Deccan Traps, left behind as India drifted north over it. The ridge formed as India separated first from Madagascar, then later from the Seychelles, tens of millions of years ago.

Why does Minicoy feel so different from the rest of Lakshadweep?

Minicoy, Lakshadweep’s southernmost island, sits far closer to the Maldives than to the rest of the archipelago, and it shows. Its people speak Mahl, a dialect of the same Dhivehi language spoken in the Maldives, not Malayalam like most of Lakshadweep. It also follows matrilineal inheritance, with women owning property and heading households. The Nine Degree Channel separates Minicoy from the main Lakshadweep group, including the Amindivi Islands.

What new way of reaching these islands began in 2026?

In May 2026, India ran its first seaplane trials between Kochi and Lakshadweep, touching down on island lagoons at Agatti, Kalpeni, Kavaratti, Kadmat, and Kiltan. Most of these islands are too small and too flat for a conventional runway, so a lagoon becomes the only usable landing strip. Here’s why it matters here: it’s a direct consequence of this article’s own flatness section, no hills, no long islands, nowhere to build a proper airport. Until recently, Agatti was the only island with an airstrip at all, and every other island depended on a day-long ship journey from Kochi. (Source: The Week, May 2026)