Tree Cover Map of Indian subcontinent depicts the curse of habitable fluvial plain.
A few weeks ago, I shared an Asian map of tree cover: https://www.reddit.com/r/geography/s/n2oUF1AGrr.
Although my post focused on the boreal forests, there was a pinch of astonishment after seeing the thematic map of the Indian part.
As evident from the map, the major clusters are located in:
North East India (due to far eastern Himalayas, and heavy rainfall - this is the wettest place on Earth),
The Himalayan belt (Bhutan, Nepal, provinces of Uttarakhand, Himachal, Jammu & Kashmir, and Northern Pakistan),
Central India (Deccan plateau regions, presence of deciduous forests. Fun fact: infamous of Revolutionary Communist insurgency)
Western Ghats (Hilly region, forests exist due to extensive rainfall in the windward side)
Tropical island of Andaman & Nicobar and Sri Lanka,
some minor green patches in Rajasthan (due to Aravalli), and Eastern ghat region in the south, exist too.
With all these stats, it may appear that India has sufficient forest cover, but it is clearly under insufficient considering the human geography of India. The lack of dense tree cover is clearly visible when we zoom out and have a look at East Asian, Russian and South East Asian maps (in the comments below). The majority of the population lives in the Northern Indian plain, traversing states that cumulatively contain more population than the entire South America. The region is blessed by the Ganges river and its tributaries, which enables productive agriculture; However that comes at a cost of forest clearance. The same pattern repeats in Bangladesh (Ganga-Brahamputra delta), Punjab province of Pakistan (Indus river course), and even in the eastern flowing rivers of South India.