NCERT Solutions Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth

F R E E S T U D Y M AT E R I A L F O R E V E R Y S T U D E N T

CLASS 6 · SOCIAL SCIENCE

NCERT Solutions

Chapter 1: Locating Places on
the Earth

NCERT Textbook — Exploring Society: India And Beyond

BOOK PAGES SECTIONS QUESTIONS MEDIUM

1 – 25 13 42 English

Solutions, notes, sample papers & more at 43 pages

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

CLASS 6 · SOCIAL SCIENCE · EXPLORING SOCIETY: INDIA AND BEYOND

NCERT Solutions — Chapter 1: Locating Places on the
Earth
Complete NCERT Solutions for Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth from the NCERT
textbook Exploring Society: India and Beyond. Every question of the unit is answered — the Let's Explore boxes
of the Introduction Why Social Science? (pages 1–6) and of the chapter itself (pages 7–25), The Big Questions,
the in-text map questions, Before we move on … and all eight Questions, activities and projects, including
the full crossword solution.

TEXTBOOK BOOK PAGES

Exploring Society: India and Beyond (Class 6) 1 – 25

SECTIONS QUESTIONS

13 42

MEDIUM

English

Let's Explore — Page 2 (Introduction)

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Introduction — Why Social Science?

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Observe the picture above. What do you notice?

What the picture above shows:
Behind everything, a rocky hill with a bare grey peak, its lower slopes
thickly covered with green trees, and a second, lower hill beside it.
In front of the hills, a wide, still sheet of water — a lake — with the hills
and the trees reflected in it.
Trees and bushes all along the near bank; beyond the far bank, small
green fields on the hill foot.
On the bank at the right, one small house with rough stone walls and a
red tiled roof, some sheets spread over part of the roof, and a little flag
on a pole beside it.
In the foreground, a narrow metalled road running past, with dry grass
on both sides.
A pale, cloudy sky above.

The photograph on page 2 of the Introduction — described here; see the textbook for
the picture itself.

The photograph shows a rural landscape. Look at it in two layers — what nature has made and
what people have made.

MADE BY NATURE MADE BY PEOPLE

A rocky hill with two peaks, covered with green forest A tarred (metalled) road curving through the foreground

A wide lake at the foot of the hill A small house with a sloping tiled roof beside the lake

Trees, grass and bushes; a cloudy sky (it looks like the A saffron flag near the house, and cleared patches that
monsoon or just after it) look like small fields

You also notice what is missing — no shops, no traffic, no tall buildings, no crowd. Only one or
two houses can be seen. So very few people live here, and they live close to the forest and the
water.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Why this picture opens the book: Social Science studies the place where nature
and human beings meet. The hill and the lake belong to geography; the house and
the flag to culture; the road to governance and the economy. A single photograph
already contains all five themes of this textbook.

Q2 Where does the water in the lake come from?

Almost all of it comes from rain — chiefly the south-west monsoon between June and
September.

Rain falls on the forested hill slopes behind the lake.
The water runs down the slopes as tiny streams and rivulets, because water always flows
from a higher place to a lower one.
At the foot of the hill the land is low, so the water collects there and forms the lake. The area
whose rainwater drains into it is called its catchment.
Some water also seeps in from underground springs, which is why such lakes do not dry up
immediately after the rains.

Why the forest matters: the trees and grass on the slope hold the soil. Without
them the rain would wash mud into the lake and slowly fill it up. Forest, hill and lake
work as one system — damage one and the others suffer.

Did you know? Many Indian lakes of exactly this kind are not natural at all. Villagers
dammed a small valley to store the monsoon rain for the dry months — the kere of
Karnataka, the eri of Tamil Nadu, the talab and bawdi of Rajasthan and Bundelkhand.
Some are more than a thousand years old and are still in use.

Q3 Who made the road and why?

Who: a road like this is built by the government, not by one family. In a village it is usually the
Gram Panchayat, the Zila Parishad, the State Public Works Department (PWD), or the Central
scheme Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), which was started in 2000 to give every
village an all-weather road. Local people are often employed to build it under schemes such as
MGNREGA.
Why: a road is a lifeline. It lets the people of the house —

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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carry their grain, milk or fish to the market and bring back salt, oil and cloth;
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send children to a school and reach a hospital or a Primary Health Centre quickly;
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reach the Panchayat office, the bank and the ration shop;

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and it lets visitors, pilgrims and tourists come to the lake and the hill.

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The Social Science point: the road proves that this lonely-looking place is

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connected to the rest of the country. Somebody planned it, somebody paid for it out
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of taxes, and somebody decided it wasmneeded here rather than somewhere else.
a setheme on Governance and Democracy is about.
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What could be the activities of people living in the small house? What
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We cannot know for certain from one photograph — but we can make sensible guesses based
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WHAT THE PICTURE

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mahua or tendu leaves from the forest, and perhaps working as guides or selling tea to visitors. Some

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Their family has probably lived near this hill for many generations. Their ancestors may have settled
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The new road may bring electricity, a mobile signal, a school bus and more visitors. Children
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may study further and take up new kinds of work. But if the forest is cut or the lake polluted,

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life here could become

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Sample answer: “The family probably farms a small field and fishes in the lake. Their

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grandparents may have settled here long ago because of the water.m In future, the
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Why the book asks it this way: notice that one small house has led us to

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economics (their work), history (their past) and geography (why they live here).
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That mixing of fields is what the book later calls multidisciplinarity.
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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Q5 Now, looking at the picture on the facing page, what questions come to your mind?
Write them down.

What the picture on the facing page shows:
A row of tall office towers of glass and steel, blue-green in colour, many
storeys high; one of them is shaped like a leaning wedge.
Company signboards fixed high on the buildings.
Street lights on tall curved poles, and blue road signboards with white
arrows, along the road in front.
A line of young trees planted between the road and the buildings.
A car on the road at the bottom edge of the picture.
A bright, almost white sky above.

The photograph on page 3 of the Introduction — described here; see the textbook for
the picture itself.

The facing page shows the exact opposite scene — a modern city business district: tall glass-
and-steel office towers, a wide divided road with lane markings, street lights, cars, and neatly
planted shrubs on the median. Good questions to write down:

Which city is this, and where did this land's earlier fields or villages go?
What work is done inside these offices? Who built them, and with whose money?
Where do the thousands of people who work here live, and how do they travel every day?
Where do the city's water and electricity come from, and where does its waste go?
Why is there no lake or forest in the picture? What happens to rainwater falling on so much
concrete?
Who keeps the roads, lights and drains working, and who pays for them?
Is life here better than in the village of the first picture — better in what way, and worse in
what way?

Why compare the two pictures: both are India, on the same day. One shows
people living with nature, the other shows people living inside something entirely
built by humans. Comparing them is the fastest way to see that a society is not one
thing but many — and that is why Social Science needs history, geography,
economics and political science together.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Q6 How do you propose to find answers to the questions related to these two images?

By using the same tools a social scientist uses. Plan it as a small project:

METHOD WHAT IT CAN TELL YOU

Careful observation (a field visit) What crops grow, how many houses there are,
how busy the road is, how clean the lake is

Asking people — interviews with elders, farmers, The history of the settlement, why the road came,
shopkeepers, the Panchayat secretary how life has changed

Maps and photographs, including old photographs and Where the place is, what it looked like 20 or 50
satellite images years ago

Written and printed sources — books, newspapers, Population, rainfall, literacy, schemes such as
district gazetteers, Census reports, government websites PMGSY

Comparing sources Whether two people or two books say the
same thing — and what to believe if they do
not

Tip: write your questions down before you start, keep a notebook of what each
person tells you, and always note who told you and when. A social scientist's answer
is only as good as the source behind it.

The Big Questions — Page 7
Chapter opening

THE BIG QUESTIONS

Q1 What is a map and how do we use it? What are its main components?

A map is a drawing, or representation, of an area as seen from above. It may show a small area
(a village, a town), a bigger one (your district or State) or a very large one (India, or the whole
world). A book or collection of maps is called an atlas.
How we use it: to find where a place is, to work out the way from one place to another, to judge
how far apart two places are, and to see information spread over an area — where mountains
are, which State grows the most wheat, where the rivers flow.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Kinds of maps:

Physical maps — natural features such as mountains, rivers and oceans.
Political maps — countries or States, their boundaries, cities and capitals.
Thematic maps — one special kind of information, for example a map of time zones or of
rainfall.

The three main components of a map are:

1. Distance — shown by the scale (say, 1 cm = 500 m)

2. Direction — the cardinal points N, E, S, W (and NE, SE, SW, NW)

3. Symbols — small fixed signs standing for roads, railway lines, temples, wells, forests …

Why all three are needed: without a scale you cannot tell whether the market is
200 metres or 2 kilometres away; without directions you do not know which way to
turn; without symbols there would not be room on the paper to draw every building
and stream.

Q2 What are coordinates? How can latitude and longitude be used to mark any location
on the Earth?

Coordinates are a pair of numbers (or a number and a letter) that together fix one exact
position. The chapter gives two everyday examples: “the 7th shop in the 5th row” in a market,
and the square d4 on a chessboard. Neither number alone is enough — the two together point
to one spot and no other.
The Earth uses the same idea, with a grid drawn on the globe:

LATITUDE LONGITUDE

Measures the the Equator, going north or south the Prime Meridian, going east or west
distance from

Shape of the line A full circle parallel to the Equator (a A half-circle from the North Pole to the South
parallel); the circles get smaller towards the Pole (a meridian); all are of the same length
poles

Runs East–west North–south

Range 0° at the Equator to 90°N and 90°S 0° at Greenwich to 180°E and 180°W

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

North Pole 90°N

parallels

meridians Equator 0°

South Pole 90°S

The grid on the globe: red = the Equator, blue circles = parallels of latitude (they shrink towards the
poles), dark blue half-circles = meridians of longitude (all equal, meeting at the poles).

Give the two values together and the place is fixed:

Delhi = 29°N latitude, 77°E longitude (rounded off)

India lies between about 8°N and 37°N, and 68°E and 97°E

Why it always works: only one point on the whole Earth has a given pair. Every
parallel crosses every meridian exactly once, so the crossing point is unique — which
is how a ship's captain, a pilot or your phone's GPS states a position.

Q3 How are local time and standard time related to longitude?

The Earth spins on its axis from west to east, one full turn of 360° in 24 hours. Divide:

Page 8 of 43

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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360° ÷ 24 h = 15° in one hour
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15° ÷ 60 min → 1° in 4 minutes
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Local time is the time given by the Sun at your own longitude — it is 12 noon for you when the
Sun is highest over your meridian. So places on different meridians have different local times:

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when it is noon at Greenwich (0°), it is 1 pm at 15°E and 11 am at 15°W.
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Standard time is one clock time chosen for
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selected meridian passing through it.glIt would be hopeless if every town in India kept its own
local time — trains, schools and television would be in chaos.

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India's standard meridian = 82°30′E (it passes near Mirzapur, Uttar Pradesh)
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Did you know? Some countries are too wide for one time zone — the USA has six
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In-text Questions — Page 8

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Let us play a game — the map of a small city (Fig. 1.1)

Q1 Imagine that you just got off a train at the railway station, and you want to visit the
bank marked on the map. Which way would you go?

N

APARTMENTS W E

S

LAKE

NAGAR PANCHAYAT PUBLIC GARDEN
RAILWAY STATION

HOSPITAL
BANK

SCHOOL MUSEUM

MARKET

Fig. 1.1 (page 8) — a map of an imaginary small city.

First find the two places on Fig. 1.1. The railway station is at the far west of the map; the bank
is towards the east, just east of the Nagar Panchayat building.
The shortest way:

1. Come out of the railway station and turn east on the road that runs in front of it.
2. Follow it past the lake on your left and the hospital on your right.
3. Keep going east; the road passes below the apartment blocks and reaches the Nagar
Panchayat.
4. The bank is the next building on that road, a little to the east.

How the map helped: you used two of the three components without noticing —
direction (the N arrow at the top right told you which way is east) and distance (you
could see that this route is shorter than going round the south). The third
component, symbols, let you recognise each building at a glance.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Q2 Are there other possible ways?

Yes. The roads in the small city form a loop, so more than one route reaches the bank.

The southern route: from the station take the road going south-east, past the school, along
the market, then east past the museum, and finally north up to the bank.
The northern route: take the road that runs north of the lake, past the apartment blocks
and towards the public garden, then turn south to the bank.

All three routes end at the same place. They differ in length and in what you pass on the way
— the southern route is longer but takes you through the market.

Try this: lay a thread along each route on the map, then straighten it against a ruler.
Using the map's scale, you can say in metres how much longer the market route is.
That is exactly how map apps compare “fastest” and “shortest”.

Q3 Can you locate the public garden, the school and the museum?

N

APARTMENTS W E

S

LAKE

NAGAR PANCHAYAT PUBLIC GARDEN
RAILWAY STATION

HOSPITAL
BANK

SCHOOL MUSEUM

MARKET

Fig. 1.1 (page 8) — a map of an imaginary small city.

Yes — each is easy to find once you use the direction arrows.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

PLACE WHERE IT IS ON THE MAP WHAT IS NEXT TO IT

Public Far north-east (top right corner), the fenced green East of the apartment blocks, north of the
garden plot bank

School South-west (bottom left), the long yellow building South of the railway station, west of the
with trees market

Museum South-east (bottom right), the white building with South of the bank, east of the market
pillars

Why symbols make this quick: you did not have to read every label. The fence and
rows of plants say “garden”, the pillared front says “museum”, the umbrellas and
carts say “market”. A well-drawn map can be read even by someone who does not
know the language of its labels.

Q4 If you want to proceed from the bank to the market, which way will you go?

The market is to the south-west of the bank, in the lower middle part of the map.

1. From the bank take the road going south (it runs down past the museum side of the town).
2. At the junction turn west on the wide road that runs along the bottom of the map.
3. The market — the row of stalls with red and blue umbrellas — is on the right, just south of
the hospital.

Another way: go back west from the bank towards the hospital, then take the road turning
south just after it; that road comes down to the market from the north.

The lesson of the whole game: a map lets you plan a journey through a city you
have never visited, and compare two routes before you take a single step. As the
book puts it, a map is like a treasure guide.

Let's Explore — Page 9

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

On the map in Fig. 1.1 (page 8)

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 On the map in Fig. 1.1 given on page 8 — Mark the hospital.

N

APARTMENTS W E

S

LAKE

NAGAR PANCHAYAT PUBLIC GARDEN
RAILWAY STATION

HOSPITAL
BANK

SCHOOL MUSEUM

MARKET

Fig. 1.1 (page 8) — a map of an imaginary small city.

The hospital is the pink building right in the middle of the map. Two signs identify it at once:

the word HOSPITAL written on the arch in front of it, and
the red cross on its wall — the sign used for medical care almost everywhere in the world.

Its neighbours help you place it: it is south of the lake, east of the school, west of the Nagar
Panchayat and north of the market. Draw a circle around it in your book, or mark it with a red
cross of your own.

Tip: when you mark anything on a map, add it to the legend (the little box that
explains the signs). A mark nobody can decode is of no use to the next reader.

Q2 What is the meaning of the blue-coloured areas?

The blue areas stand for water bodies. On this map they are:

the lake — the large blue patch with wavy lines, in the north-west, and
the stream or river that comes down from the north and feeds it.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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Why blue: map makers all over the world follow a colour code so that a map can be

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understood at a glance — blue for water, green for forests, plains and gardens,
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brown or.cyellow for hills and higher land, black or red for roads,
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The public garden is the farthest.
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Look at the map from west to east. The railway station is at the extreme west edge. Now
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School Just to the south-east, very close by Nearest

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Check it yourself: put the edge of a ruler on the map and measure the straight-line
distance from the station to each of the three places. If the map's scale were 1 cm =
500 m, you could turn each measurement into real metres.

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How to do it well — in five steps:

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

1. Walk and look first. Note the school gate, the main building, the playground, and what
stands on each side of the school.
2. Fix the directions. Find north (the Sun rises roughly east; a compass or a phone compass is
surer). Draw the N arrow in a corner of your sheet before anything else.
3. Choose a scale. For example, count your paces: if the school gate to the main door is 50
paces (about 35 m), let 1 cm = 10 m. Write the scale on the map.
4. Draw from above, not as a picture from the front. Rooftops become rectangles, roads
become double lines, trees become small circles.
5. Add a legend explaining every symbol and colour you used — blue for the water tank, green
for the garden, and so on.

Sample answer for the discussion: “All five maps showed the same school, but they
did not look alike. One group made the playground very large because they play
there; another forgot the north arrow, so its map could not be matched with the
rest. The two maps that used a scale could be compared cell by cell; the rest could
not.”
Two lessons come out of the comparison: a map is a choice — the map maker
decides what to include — and a map without direction and scale cannot be used
by anyone else.

Let's Explore — Page 10
Scale — the playground

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Draw a simple map of a school's playground. Let us assume it is a rectangle, 40 m in
length and 30 m in width. Draw it precisely with your ruler on a scale of 1 cm = 10 m.

Convert each real measurement into centimetres on the paper using the given scale.

Scale: 1 cm on the map = 10 m on the ground
Length 40 m → 40 ÷ 10 = 4 cm

Width 30 m → 30 ÷ 10 = 3 cm

So draw a rectangle of 4 cm × 3 cm with your ruler.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

4 cm on the map = 40 m

N
3 cm diagonal 5 cm = 50 m
= 30 m

Scale 1 cm = 10 m

The playground drawn to scale: every 1 cm of the drawing stands for 10 m of real ground.

Why the shape stays correct: both sides are divided by the same number, so the
drawing has the same shape as the real playground, only smaller. If you shrank the
length but not the width, the map would lie about the ground.

Q2 Now measure the diagonal of the rectangle. How many centimetres do you get?
Using the scale, calculate the real length of the playground's diagonal, in metres.

Put your ruler from one corner to the opposite corner of the 4 cm × 3 cm rectangle.

Measured diagonal on the map = 5 cm

1 cm stands for 10 m

Real diagonal = 5 × 10 = 50 metres

Check it without the ruler. The sides 30 m, 40 m and the diagonal form a right-angled triangle:

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

40² + 30² = 1600 + 900 = 2500

√2500 = 50 m ✔

Why the two answers agree: a map drawn to scale is a faithful small copy of the
ground. Anything you measure on it — a side, a diagonal, the distance between two
trees — can be turned back into a real distance by multiplying by the scale. This is
exactly what you will do in the exercise with the Narmada and the Ganga.

Did you know? 3, 4, 5 is the most famous right-angled triple. Masons in India still
use a knotted 12-unit string (3 + 4 + 5) to set out a perfect right angle for the corner
of a house.

Let's Explore — Page 11

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Directions on the map of the small city

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Consider the map of the small city again. Identify the correct and incorrect
statements in the list below: 1. The market is north of the hospital.

N

APARTMENTS W E

S

LAKE

NAGAR PANCHAYAT PUBLIC GARDEN
RAILWAY STATION

HOSPITAL
BANK

SCHOOL MUSEUM

MARKET

Fig. 1.1 (page 8) — a map of an imaginary small city.

Incorrect.
On Fig. 1.1 the hospital stands in the middle of the map and the market lies below it. On a map
the top is north and the bottom is south, so:

The market is south of the hospital — not north.

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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The four cardinal directions (N, E, S, W) and the four intermediate ones (NE, SE, SW, NW). Reading
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Rule to remember: unless a map says otherwise, north is at the top. Turn the page
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around and the picture still means north at the arrow's head — that is why every

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

The bank is in the eastern half of the map, a little above the middle. The museum lies below it
(south) and slightly to the right (east). South + east together give the intermediate direction
south-east.

Museum is south-east (SE) of the bank ✔

Tip: when a place is neither exactly below nor exactly to the side, use an
intermediate direction. Say the north–south word first — north-east, south-west —
the way the compass rose is labelled.

Q3 3. The railway station is northwest of the hospital.

Correct.
Stand at the hospital in the middle of the map. The railway station is to your left (west) and a
little above (north). West + north = north-west.

Railway station is north-west (NW) of the hospital ✔

And the opposite is also true: the hospital is south-east of the railway station.

Why direction always needs a starting point: “north-west” is meaningless by itself.
The station is north-west of the hospital but south-west of the apartments. Always
name the place you are measuring from.

Q4 4. The lake is northwest of the apartment blocks.

Incorrect.
The apartment blocks are drawn along the top (north) of the map, and the lake lies below and
to the left of them.

West + south = south-west

So the lake is south-west of the apartment blocks, not north-west.

Page 20 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Checking the other way round makes it clear: the apartment blocks are north-east of the lake.

Check it yourself: lay a pencil flat on the map from the middle of the apartments to
the middle of the lake. It points down-left — towards the bottom-left corner, which is
south-west.

Q5 Taking your school as the starting point, do you know approximately in which
cardinal direction your home is located? Discuss with your teacher and your
parents.

This is about your own town, so find it out rather than copy it. How to find the answer:

1. Stand at the school gate in the morning and face the rising Sun — you are facing roughly
east. North is then on your left, south on your right and west behind you.
2. Now think of the way you walk or ride home. Which of those four directions do you mostly
move in?
3. Confirm it with a compass, or with the compass app on a phone, or by looking up your
school and your home on an online map (north is at the top).
4. If your home is not exactly in one cardinal direction, use an intermediate one — “roughly
north-east”.

Sample answer: “My school faces the main road. When I leave school I walk with the
afternoon Sun on my face for most of the way, so I am walking towards the west. My
home is about 1.5 km west of the school, a little to the north — so I would say west-
north-west.”

Why the Sun works: the Sun rises in the eastern sky and sets in the western sky.
That single fact has guided Indian travellers, sailors and builders for thousands of
years — temples, mosques and even village houses are often aligned using it.

Let's Explore — Page 11

Page 21 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Symbols — a map of your own locality

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Draw a rough map of your locality or your village, including your home, school and
a few other important landmarks. Show the cardinal directions and use a few of the
symbols shown in Fig. 1.2 on page 12 to mark some important features.

Railway Line: broad gauge,
metre gauge, railway station
RS

Roads: metalled, unmetalled

Boundary: international,
state, district

River, well, tank, canal, bridge

Temple, church, mosque, chhatri

Post Office, Post & Telegraph
Office, Police Station PO PTO PS

Settlement, graveyard

Trees, grass

Fig. 1.2 (page 12) — a selection of symbols commonly used in maps.

What your map must contain to be a proper map and not just a drawing:

a north arrow;
a title (“Map of Rampur village” / “My locality”);
a rough scale or at least an idea of distance (“1 cm ≈ 100 m”);
symbols taken from Fig. 1.2 — the Survey of India signs; and
a legend explaining each symbol you have used.

Useful symbols from Fig. 1.2: double line for a metalled road, dashed double line for an
unmetalled road, hatched line for a railway line with RS for the station, a wavy blue band for a
river and a small circle for a well, a blue patch for a tank, a small flagged square for a temple,
and PO, PTO, PS for a post office, a post & telegraph office and a police station.

Page 22 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

river N
temple well

metalled road

School Home

PO

unmetalled road

A sample rough sketch map. Yours will look different — but it must have the same four things: title,
north arrow, symbols and a legend.

Sample answer (what to write below your map): “Map of my locality, scale about 1
cm = 100 m. My home is on the eastern side of the main road; my school is about
400 m to the west, on the southern side. The temple is north of the road and the
village well is to the north-east. The post office (PO) is near the crossing of the main
road and the kachcha road.”

Why fixed symbols matter: the Survey of India, set up in 1767 and the country's
oldest scientific department, fixes one set of signs for all Indian maps. Because
everybody uses the same signs, a soldier, a farmer and a schoolchild all read the
same map in the same way.

Let's Explore — Page 13

Page 23 of 43

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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Understanding coordinates — the chessboard
co m
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LET'S EXPLORE

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White has played the queen's pawn from d2 to d4. Playing black, “the same move” means the
mirror image of it — the pawn in front

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

The two coordinates of a square are its file letter and its rank number. White's pawn has come from
d2 to d4 (red); black answers by playing from d7 to d5 (blue).

Why d7 and not something else: black's pieces start on ranks 7 and 8, exactly opposite white's
ranks 1 and 2. The black queen stands on d8, so her pawn is on d7. Moving it two squares
forward — which a pawn is allowed to do on its first move — brings it to d5, face to face with
white's pawn on d4.

The Social Science point: the letter tells you the column (file) and the number tells
you the row (rank). Neither alone is enough; together they name one square out of
64. Latitude and longitude do the same job for the Earth — and both systems were
invented for the same reason, to record a position so that somebody else can find it
again.

Did you know? Chess grew out of the ancient Indian game chaturaṅga, played in
India by about the 6th century CE. Its four “limbs” — elephants, horses, chariots and
foot soldiers — became today's bishops, knights, rooks and pawns.

Let's Explore — Page 17
Reading coordinates from a globe or atlas

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 If the globe or atlas in your class has well-marked latitudes and longitudes, try to
note down approximate values for the latitude and longitude of (1) Mumbai, (2)
Kolkata, (3) Singapore, (4) Paris.

Find the place, then read the nearest parallel across it and the nearest meridian down it.
Rounded to the nearest degree, you should get values close to these:

Page 25 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

PLACE LATITUDE LONGITUDE WHAT THE NUMBERS TELL YOU

Mumbai 19°N 73°E North of the Equator, well inside the tropics — hot and
(Maharashtra) humid all year

Kolkata (West 23°N 88°E Almost on the Tropic of Cancer, and 15° east of
Bengal) Mumbai — the Sun rises there about an hour earlier

Singapore 1°N 104°E Practically on the Equator — no real winter, rain
through the year

Paris (France) 49°N 2°E Far from the Equator and close to the Prime Meridian
— cold winters, long summer days

What the table shows: latitude explains climate — Singapore at 1°N is torrid all
year, Paris at 49°N is temperate with a cold winter. Longitude explains time —
Singapore (104°E) is ahead of Paris (2°E) by about 6 hours 45 minutes of local time.

Tip: your atlas and your friend's may differ by a degree or two. That is fine — the
book itself says these values are “rounded off, not exact”. What matters is that you
write N or S with the latitude and E or W with the longitude; “19, 73” by itself means
nothing.

Let's Explore — Page 21
Understanding time zones — Porbandar and Tinsukia

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Two friends, one sitting in Porbandar (Gujarat) and the other in Tinsukia (Assam),
are speaking on the phone late afternoon. The latter remarks that the sun has set
in Assam and it's now dark. The former is surprised and says, “But it's still full
daylight here!” Explain why.

Because the two friends are far apart in longitude, and the Earth turns from west to east.

Tinsukia is in the extreme east of India (about 95°E); Porbandar is in the extreme west
(about 70°E).
As the Earth spins eastward, the eastern places are carried into the sunlight first and out of
it first. So the Sun both rises and sets earlier in Assam than in Gujarat.

Page 26 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

By the time the Sun has set in Tinsukia, Porbandar has still to turn through about 25 more
degrees before its own sunset — roughly one and three-quarter hours of daylight left.

Earth turns 360° in 24 hours → 15° in 1 hour

The farther east a place is, the earlier its sunrise and its sunset.

What confused the friends: both their clocks showed the same time, because all of
India follows one Indian Standard Time. Their clocks were equal, but their local
times — the times told by their own Sun — were not. That is the whole difference
between standard time and local time.

Did you know? This is a real and much-discussed problem. In Tinsukia the Sun rises
before 4:30 am in June and sets soon after 4:15 pm in December, so a great deal of
daylight is wasted while offices still work to IST. Assam has often asked for a
separate “Chaibagan (tea-garden) time”, one hour ahead of IST.

Q2 And, as a class activity, calculate the difference in local time between those two
cities. (Hint: for now, consider the difference in longitude between Porbandar and
Tinsukia to be 30°; later, you can find out the precise value.)

Use the rate at which the Earth turns.

360° in 24 hours → 360 ÷ 24 = 15° per hour

Difference in longitude = 30°

Difference in local time = 30 ÷ 15 = 2 hours

So when it is 6 pm local time in Porbandar, it is already 8 pm local time in Tinsukia — which is
why it is dark there while it is still bright in Gujarat.
The precise value (the “later” the hint promises): Porbandar lies at about 69.6°E and Tinsukia at
about 95.4°E.

Page 27 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Difference = 95.4° − 69.6° = 25.8°

1° takes 4 minutes → 25.8 × 4 = 103.2 minutes

= about 1 hour 43 minutes

Why the two answers differ: the hint's 30° is a round figure chosen to make the
arithmetic easy. The real gap is a little smaller, so the real difference is a little under
two hours. Both calculations use the same rule — 1° of longitude = 4 minutes of
time.

Let's Explore — Page 21
Local time and standard time

LET'S EXPLORE

Q1 Return to the two friends sitting in Gujarat and Assam. Use this example to explain
the difference between local time and standard time.

The two friends give us both kinds of time at the same moment.

LOCAL TIME STANDARD TIME

What The Sun over that particular meridian — it is 12 One meridian chosen for the whole country
decides it noon when the Sun is highest there

In our The Sun has already set at Tinsukia (95°E) while it Both friends' clocks and phones show
example is still day at Porbandar (70°E) — their local times exactly the same time, because both follow
differ by about 1 h 43 min IST

How many A different one for every meridian — thousands of Only one: IST = GMT + 5:30, based on
in India them 82°30′E, which passes near Mirzapur in
Uttar Pradesh

Why we It matches daily life with the Sun It lets trains, flights, schools, offices and
need it TV news work to one timetable

Putting it in one sentence: local time is the time the Sun shows you where you stand; standard
time is the time the country agrees to keep on its clocks.

Page 28 of 43

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Q2 Every place on the Earth has a location which can be precisely defined with the help
of a grid of latitudes and longitudes — imaginary lines running from east to west
(parallel to the Equator) and north to south (from pole to pole) respectively.

Unpacking the grid:

PARALLELS OF LATITUDE MERIDIANS OF LONGITUDE

Direction of the East–west North–south
line

Shape Full circles; smaller as you go towards Half-circles, all of the same length, meeting at the
the poles two poles

Zero line The Equator, 0° The Prime Meridian at Greenwich, 0°

Highest value 90°N and 90°S (the poles) 180°E = 180°W (the same line)

They are called imaginary lines because nothing is painted on the ground — they are drawn
only on maps and globes. But the positions they give are exact: Delhi 29°N, 77°E.

The one thing to remember: latitude first, longitude second, and never forget the
letter — 19°N 73°E is Mumbai, but 19°S 73°W is an empty stretch of the Pacific
Ocean.

Q3 Longitude also marks the time and defines the time zones.

Because the Earth turns 360° in 24 hours:

360° ÷ 24 h = 15° per hour • 1° = 4 minutes

Every meridian therefore has its own local time, one hour later for each 15° you move east.
Countries group these into time zones — broad bands about 15° wide — and keep one
standard time inside each.
The zone boundaries on the world map (Fig. 1.8) are not straight: they bend to follow
international borders so that a country is not split between two times.
India keeps a single standard time, IST = GMT + 5:30. Large countries cannot: the USA has 6
zones, Russia 11.

Page 30 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Did you know? A few countries use half-hour or even quarter-hour offsets — India
+5:30, Myanmar +6:30, Nepal +5:45. That is why the globe in Fig. 1.9 shows +5.5 over
India.

Q4 The International Date Line is located approximately at 180 degrees longitude,
opposite the Prime Meridian. Crossing the International Date Line changes the date
by one day.

The International Date Line (IDL) runs down the middle of the Pacific Ocean, on the far side of
the Earth from Greenwich. It is where the +12 and −12 time zones meet, so the calendar has to
jump.

Crossing it travelling eastward → subtract a day (Monday becomes Sunday)

Crossing it travelling westward → add a day (Sunday becomes Monday)

Why “approximately” 180°: the line is deliberately bent — it zig-zags around Russia's Chukotka,
around the Aleutian Islands of the USA and around the island groups of Kiribati, Fiji and Samoa
— so that no country has two different dates on the same day.

Why such a line must exist: travel right round the world adding an hour each 15°
eastward and you gain 24 hours by the time you return. Somewhere the extra day
has to be given back. That “somewhere” is the International Date Line.

Questions, activities and projects — Pages 24–25

Page 31 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

End-of-chapter exercise

Q1 Returning to page 10 and to Fig. 5.2 in Chapter 5 of this textbook, taking the scale
to be 2.5 cm = 500 km, calculate the real distance from the estuary of the Narmada
River to the estuary of the Ganga river. (Hint: round off your measurement on the
map to an easy number.)

Ganga
Ganga

Narmada
Narmada

estuary of the Narmada estuary of the Ganga

Arabian Sea Bay of Bengal

0 500 1,000 km

The map of India this question sends you to — the Narmada and the Ganga, with each
river’s estuary marked. Drawn here at true latitude and longitude; the book’s own map
is Fig. 5.2 in Chapter 5.

Step 1 — find the two estuaries on the map of India. The Narmada flows westward and
meets the Arabian Sea in the Gulf of Khambhat in Gujarat. The Ganga flows eastward and
meets the Bay of Bengal through the delta of the Sundarbans in West Bengal.

Page 32 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Step 2 — measure the straight line between them with your ruler. It comes to about 8 cm
(this is the “easy number” the hint asks you to round off to).
Step 3 — use the scale.

2.5 cm on the map = 500 km on the ground

So 1 cm = 500 ÷ 2.5 = 200 km

Measured distance = 8 cm

Real distance = 8 × 200 = 1,600 km

So the two river mouths are roughly 1,600 kilometres apart in a straight line — about the same
as the flying distance from Ahmedabad to Kolkata.

Estuary: the place where a river meets the sea (the book's margin note on page 24).
The Narmada has a funnel-shaped estuary; the Ganga instead builds a huge delta,
the largest in the world, shared by India and Bangladesh.

Why your answer may differ a little: the exact points you choose on the coast, and
how you round your measurement, can change the result by 100 km or so. That is
normal — a scale gives a good estimate, not a surveyor's figure. What must be right
is the method: measure, then multiply by what 1 cm stands for.

Q2 Why is it 5:30 pm in India when it is 12 pm or noon in London?

Because India's clocks are set 5 hours 30 minutes ahead of Greenwich, and that number
comes straight from longitude.

London (Greenwich) is on the Prime Meridian, 0°

India's standard meridian = 82°30′E (it passes near Mirzapur, Uttar Pradesh)

The Earth turns 15° in one hour

82°30′ ÷ 15° = 5.5 hours = 5 hours 30 minutes

12:00 noon GMT + 5:30 = 5:30 pm IST

Page 33 of 43

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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
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Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Q4 Find out what you have in the eight directions from your home or school.

How to do it properly:

1. Stand at the gate of your home or school. Fix north first — by the morning Sun (it rises
roughly in the east), by a compass, or by a phone compass.
2. Draw a compass rose on a page: N at the top, then clockwise NE, E, SE, S, SW, W, NW.
3. Look along each of the eight lines and write down the nearest important landmark in that
direction.
4. Check the doubtful ones with your parents or teacher, or on a printed map of your town.

DIRECTION SAMPLE ANSWER — FROM MY SCHOOL

North (N) The village pond and the water tank

North-east (NE) The Primary Health Centre

East (E) The main road and the bus stop

South-east (SE) The weekly market ground

South (S) Wheat fields and a canal

South-west (SW) The Gram Panchayat office

West (W) My home and the post office

North-west (NW) The temple and a mango orchard

Write your own. Replace every entry above with what is actually around your
school, then draw the eight arrows on a rough map with the landmarks marked.
Keep it — you can use the same sketch for the “map of your locality” activity on page
11.

Q5 What is the difference between local time and standard time? Discuss it in groups,
with each group writing an answer in 100 to 150 words. Compare the answers.

Model answer (about 140 words):

Page 35 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Local time is the time shown by the Sun at a particular place. When the Sun is highest over a
meridian, it is 12 noon for every place on that meridian. Since the Earth turns 15° in an hour,
each meridian has its own local time; a place 15° to the east is one hour ahead. Standard time is
a single clock time that a whole country agrees to keep, based on one chosen meridian passing
through it. India's standard meridian is 82°30′E, near Mirzapur in Uttar Pradesh, so Indian
Standard Time is 5 hours 30 minutes ahead of Greenwich Mean Time. Because of this, the Sun
rises in Tinsukia in Assam nearly two hours before it rises in Porbandar in Gujarat, yet clocks in
both towns show the same time. Local time follows the Sun; standard time follows an
agreement that keeps trains, schools and offices working together.

For the group comparison: good answers will all contain four things — (1) local
time is decided by the Sun and the meridian, (2) standard time is one time chosen
for a country, (3) the figure 15° per hour or 1° = 4 minutes, and (4) one clear Indian
example. Check each group's answer against this list rather than against its length.

Q6 Delhi's and Bengaluru's latitudes are 29°N and 13°N; their longitudes are almost the
same, 77°E. How much will be the difference in local time between the two cities?

There will be no difference — the local time in both cities is the same.

Local time depends only on longitude

Longitude of Delhi = 77°E, longitude of Bengaluru = 77°E

Difference in longitude = 0°

Difference in local time = 0 × 4 minutes = 0 minutes

The two cities lie almost on the same meridian, one nearly 1,750 km north of the other. The Sun
crosses that meridian at the same moment for both, so it is midday in Delhi and in Bengaluru at
the same instant.

Then what does the latitude change? Not the time of noon, but the length of the
day and the climate. Bengaluru at 13°N gets days of nearly equal length all year
and a mild climate. Delhi at 29°N has long summer days and short winter days, a
very hot May and a cold January. Latitude decides climate and season; longitude
decides time.

Page 36 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Careful: sunrise in Delhi and Bengaluru is not at the same clock time, because
latitude changes how early the Sun climbs above the horizon at different seasons.
But noon — the Sun at its highest — happens together, and that is what local time
measures.

Q7 Mark the following statements as true or false; explain your answers with a
sentence or two. (a) All parallels of latitude have the same length. (b) The length of
a meridian of longitude is half of that of the Equator. (c) The South Pole has a
latitude of 90°S. (d) In Assam, the local time and the IST are identical. (e) Lines
separating the time zones are identical with meridians of longitude. (f) The Equator
is also a parallel of latitude.

STATEMENT TRUE / REASON
FALSE

(a) All parallels of latitude have False The Equator is the longest circle. The parallels grow smaller
the same length. as you move towards either pole, until 90°N and 90°S are
only points.

(b) The length of a meridian of True A meridian is a half-circle from pole to pole, while the
longitude is half of that of the Equator is a complete circle of the same size. So a meridian is
Equator. half as long.

(c) The South Pole has a latitude True Latitude is counted from 0° at the Equator to a maximum of
of 90°S. 90° at each pole — 90°N for the North Pole and 90°S for the
South Pole.

(d) In Assam, the local time and False IST is based on 82°30′E, but Assam lies near 92°–95°E. Its
the IST are identical. local time runs roughly 40 minutes to an hour ahead of IST,
which is why the Sun rises there so early.

(e) Lines separating the time False They only follow the 15° meridians broadly. As Fig. 1.8
zones are identical with shows, they bend to follow international borders so that a
meridians of longitude. country is not divided between two standard times.

(f) The Equator is also a parallel of True It is the 0° parallel — the starting line from which all other
latitude. latitudes are measured, and the largest of them all.

Page 37 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Watch the pair (a) and (b) together: all meridians are equal in length, but
parallels are not. Students often mix the two. Remember it from the globe: the
meridians all meet at the poles, so they must be equal; the parallels are stacked
circles of different sizes.

Page 38 of 43

as e
Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth
a g l AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

co m
m.
Solve the crossword below. ACROSS: 1. Lets you squeeze a huge area into your map;
se
Q8

o m l a
4. A convenient sphere; 5. The longest parallel of latitude; 6. The place the Prime

m .c is attached to; 8. So convenient to find your way; 10.aAg measure of the
Meridian

l a se
distance from the Equator. DOWN: 2. A measure of the distance from the Prime
a g Meridian; 3. These two together allow us to locate a place; 6. What latitudes and
longitudes together create; 7. The time we all follow in India; 9. On top of the world;

co m
. ag
11. An abbreviation for a line across which the day and date change.

se m
l a
ag Locating places on Earth
1 2

co m
em.
m l as
.co a g
sem
3

a
agl
4

m a s
m
5
.co agl
l a se
a g

co m
.
6 7

em
m l as
.co g
8 9

m a
l a se
a g 10 11

se m
com g l a
m . a
ase
agl
The crossword grid printed on page 25.

co m
m .
ase
. com a g l
sem

a
agl c
.
NO. CLUE ANSWER

s e m
m a
.co agl
1 Across Lets you squeeze a huge area into your map SCALE

se m
4 Across
g l a
A convenient sphere GLOBE

5 Across
a
The longest parallel of latitude EQUATOR

co m
m .
m as e
.co


a g l Page 39 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

NO. CLUE ANSWER

6 Across The place the Prime Meridian is attached to GREENWICH

8 Across So convenient to find your way MAP

10 Across A measure of the distance from the Equator LATITUDE

2 Down A measure of the distance from the Prime Meridian LONGITUDE

3 Down These two together allow us to locate a place COORDINATES

6 Down What latitudes and longitudes together create GRID

7 Down The time we all follow in India IST

9 Down On top of the world POLE

11 Down An abbreviation for a line across which the day and date change IDL

1 2
S C A L E

O
3
N C
4
G L O B E

I O
5
E Q U A T O R

U D

D I
6 7
G R E E N W I C H
8 9
M A P R A S

O I T T
10 11
L A T I T U D E E

E D S

L

The completed crossword. The red numbers are the clue numbers printed in your book.

Page 40 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

How the crossings check your answers: the L of SCALE begins LONGITUDE; the G
of GREENWICH begins GRID; the I of GREENWICH begins IST; the P of MAP begins
POLE, whose L is the L of LATITUDE; and the I of LATITUDE begins IDL (International
Date Line).

Chapter at a glance
A map is a drawing of an area seen from above. It may show a village, a district, a State,
India or the whole world. A book or collection of maps is an atlas.
Maps are of three main kinds — physical (mountains, rivers, oceans), political (countries,
States, capitals) and thematic (one special kind of information).
Every map has three components: distance (shown by the scale, e.g. 1 cm = 500 m),
direction (the four cardinal points N, E, S, W and the four intermediate ones NE, SE, SW,
NW) and symbols (fixed by the Survey of India for Indian maps).
The Earth is nearly a sphere, so a globe shows it better than a flat sheet. On the globe,
parallels of latitude measure the distance north or south of the Equator (0°, up to 90°N
and 90°S) and meridians of longitude measure the distance east or west of the Prime
Meridian at Greenwich (0°, up to 180°).
Latitude and longitude together are the two coordinates of a place — Delhi lies near 29°N,
77°E. India extends roughly from 8°N to 37°N and from 68°E to 97°E.
The Earth turns 360° in 24 hours, that is 15° in one hour or 1° in 4 minutes. So longitude
also fixes time. Indian Standard Time is GMT + 5:30, and the International Date Line,
near 180°, changes the date by one day.
Long before Greenwich, India had its own prime meridian — the madhya rekhā through
Ujjayinī (Ujjain), where the astronomer Varāhamihira worked about 1,500 years ago.

Page 41 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

Quick revision

TERM WHAT IT MEANS WHERE IT APPEARS EXAMPLE
IN THE CHAPTER

Map A drawing of an area as seen from Page 8–9, Fig. 1.1 The map of the imaginary
above small city

Atlas A book or collection of maps Page 9 Your school atlas

Scale How much ground one centimetre Page 10 1 cm = 500 m; 2.5 cm = 500
on the map stands for km on Fig. 5.2

Cardinal North, east, south, west Page 10 The N arrow on every map
directions

Intermediate NE, SE, SW, NW Page 10 The museum is southeast of
directions the bank

Symbol A small fixed sign that stands for Pages 11–12, Fig. 1.2 Survey of India signs for a
a feature bridge, a temple, a post
office

Globe A sphere with a map drawn on it Page 12 The classroom globe

Coordinates The pair of numbers that fixes a Page 13 d4 on a chessboard; 29°N,
position 77°E for Delhi

Equator The 0° parallel, the largest circle, Page 14, Fig. 1.3 Passes through Kenya,
halfway between the poles Indonesia, Ecuador

Parallel of An east–west circle showing Page 14 Tropic of Cancer, about
latitude distance from the Equator 23½°N, crosses eight Indian
States

Meridian of A half-circle from pole to pole Pages 15–16 82°30′E, India's standard
longitude showing distance from the Prime meridian
Meridian

Prime Meridian The 0° meridian, fixed at Page 16 Greenwich, in London
Greenwich in 1884

madhya rekhā India's own ancient prime Page 17, Fig. 1.5 Ujjain, Kurukṣhetra, Rohitaka
meridian through Ujjayinī

Standard time One clock time for a whole Page 21 IST = GMT + 5:30
country, based on one meridian

Page 42 of 43

Class 6 Social Science Chapter 1 Locating Places on the Earth AglaSem · NCERT Solutions

TERM WHAT IT MEANS WHERE IT APPEARS EXAMPLE
IN THE CHAPTER

International The line near 180° where the date Pages 22–23 Crossing it eastward, you
Date Line changes subtract a day

Page 43 of 43