Which of the following rivers are the tributaries of the Sindhu river ?
A. Jhelum, Chenab, Kosi, Sutlej
B. Gandak, Kosi, Ghagra, Son
C. Sutlej, Beas, Ravi, Chenab
D. Kabul, Kurram, Swat, Jhelum

Question

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Correct — option (2), 'C and D are correct.' Group C — Sutlej, Beas, Ravi, Chenab — names four of the five classical rivers of the Punjab (the fifth being the Jhelum), all of which join the Indus (Sindhu) system: the Beas joins the Sutlej, the Ravi and Chenab converge with the Sutlej-Beas combination, and the resulting flow joins the Indus in Pakistan's Punjab province before the river continues to the Arabian Sea. Group D — Kabul, Kurram, Swat, Jhelum — names the Indus's major western/right-bank tributaries flowing in from Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier region (Kabul, Kurram, Swat), together with the Jhelum, which joins the Chenab and so ultimately feeds the Indus from the east. Every river in both C and D genuinely belongs to the Indus drainage system, which is why option (2) is correct. Groups A and B fail because each smuggles in a river that belongs to the Ganga system instead: the Kosi, a major left-bank Himalayan tributary of the Ganga rising in Nepal, appears in both A and B and has no connection to the Indus at all, and B additionally lists the Gandak, Ghagra and Son, all of which are Ganga tributaries in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh — none of them drain into the Indus. A single misplaced river is enough to disqualify an entire group in this kind of item, which is exactly what happens to A and B here.

Why the other options are wrong — (a) Both named groups are wrong. Group A lists the Kosi alongside genuine Indus tributaries (Jhelum, Chenab, Sutlej), but the Kosi is a major Himalayan tributary of the Ganga, not the Indus, which disqualifies the whole group. Group B is entirely Ganga-system rivers — Gandak, Kosi, Ghagra and Son all join the Ganga in the Bihar–Uttar Pradesh stretch — and contains no Indus tributary at all.  (c) Group D (Kabul, Kurram, Swat, Jhelum) is correctly identified as genuine Indus tributaries, but group B is wrongly included. Every river in B — Gandak, Kosi, Ghagra, Son — belongs to the Ganga drainage system in the Indo-Gangetic plain, not the Indus, so pairing B with D mixes one correct group with one that is entirely wrong.  (d) Group C (Sutlej, Beas, Ravi, Chenab) is correctly identified as genuine Indus tributaries — the classical rivers of Punjab — but group A is wrongly included alongside it. Group A lists the Kosi together with three real Indus tributaries (Jhelum, Chenab, Sutlej); the Kosi alone is enough to disqualify the group, since it is a Ganga tributary rising in Nepal and draining through Bihar, with no link to the Indus system.

Concept: The Indus (Sindhu) river system drains north-western India and Pakistan, fed on its eastern side by the five rivers of the Punjab — Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas and Sutlej, which give the region its name (panj-ab, 'five waters') — and on its western side by rivers descending from Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier, chiefly the Kabul, Kurram, Gomal and Swat. The Ganga system, by contrast, is fed from the north by Himalayan rivers such as the Gandak, Kosi, Ghagra and Gomti, and from the south by peninsular rivers such as the Son and Chambal-Yamuna system. The two river systems do not share tributaries — a river belongs to one drainage basin or the other — which is the fact this question is built to test.

State PCS 2025 Q26 — Geography PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2025 Q26 — Geography PYQ with Answer