CDS (II) 2022 General Knowledge · Question 110 of 120

Correct — C, Lhotse Peak. Lhotse is not in the Bay of Bengal at all. At 8,516 metres it is the fourth-highest mountain on Earth, after Everest, K2 and Kangchenjunga, and it stands on the border between the Tibet Autonomous Region of China and the Khumbu region of Nepal. It is part of the Everest massif — Everest to its north, Nuptse to its west — and its western face carries the standard climbing route up to the South Col. That single figure settles the question: the Andaman and Nicobar Islands are the emergent tops of a submarine ridge, and their highest point, Saddle Peak, reaches only 732 metres. Nothing in the archipelago comes within eight kilometres of Lhotse's height. The other three names are all genuine island peaks.

• (a)Saddle Peak — A real island peak, and the highest of them all — 732 metres on North Andaman Island, near Diglipur, with Saddle Peak National Park around it.
• (b)Mount Thuillier — A real island peak, 642 metres, on Great Nicobar. It is named after Colonel Henry Thuillier of the Survey of India and is the high point of the Nicobar group.
• (d)Mount Diavolo — A real island peak, 512 metres, and the highest point of Middle Andaman Island. Its odd Italian-sounding name is one of many left on the archipelago by early European charting.

The Andaman and Nicobar Islands are not volcanic cones sitting on a plain of ocean; they are the exposed crests of a submarine ridge that continues the Arakan Yoma of Myanmar southward towards Sumatra, marking the boundary where the Indian plate is descending beneath the Burma plate. That is why the relief is modest and ridge-like rather than dramatic. The one genuinely volcanic element lies to the east — Barren Island, India's only active volcano, and Narcondam, which is dormant.

Odd-one-out questions on place names are usually decided by scale rather than by memory of every name. Here, if you know that Lhotse belongs to the Everest group you are done, and if you do not, the giveaway is that the Andamans are low islands where an eight-thousander cannot exist. Build the roster of the archipelago from north to south — Saddle Peak on North Andaman, Mount Diavolo on Middle Andaman, Mount Harriet on South Andaman, Mount Thuillier on Great Nicobar — and the same three or four names will keep reappearing in different papers. Two more anchors from the same geography are worth carrying: the Ten Degree Channel separates the Andaman group from the Nicobar group, and Indira Point on Great Nicobar is the southernmost point of India.

• Saddle Peak, 732 metres, on North Andaman Island, is the highest point of the archipelago.
• Mount Thuillier, 642 metres, is on Great Nicobar.
• Mount Diavolo, 512 metres, is the highest point of Middle Andaman Island.
• Lhotse, 8,516 metres, is the world's fourth-highest mountain, on the Nepal-Tibet border in the Everest massif.
• Barren Island, east of the Andamans, is India's only active volcano.

• Confusing Mount Thuillier on Great Nicobar with Mount Harriet on South Andaman.
• Assuming every peak with a European name in India belongs to a hill station in the mainland Ghats.
• Placing Saddle Peak on Middle Andaman; it is on North Andaman, while Mount Diavolo is the Middle Andaman high point.

As an odd-one-out among island peaks, or as a peak-to-island match — Saddle Peak with North Andaman, Mount Thuillier with Great Nicobar.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Ten Degree Channel separates which two groups of islands?

  • (a)Andaman and Nicobar groups
  • (b)Amindivi and Laccadive groups
  • (c)Great Nicobar and Sumatra
  • (d)North Andaman and Middle Andaman

  Answer(a) Andaman and Nicobar groups — Little Andaman lies to its north and Car Nicobar to its south.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  India's only active volcano is located on which island?

  • (a)Narcondam Island
  • (b)Barren Island
  • (c)Little Andaman
  • (d)Car Nicobar

  Answer(b) Barren Island — in the Andaman Sea, east of the main Andaman group; Narcondam nearby is dormant.