Instruct: Given a question, retrieve documents that can help answer the question.
Query: Which countries are spanned by the Himalayas?
The Himalayan states are a group of countries straddling the Himalayan mountain range in Asia. The area is divided between the Western Himalaya and the Eastern Himalaya. Two sovereign states, Nepal and Bhutan, are located almost entirely within the mountain range. The range also covers the southern Tibetan Autonomous Region of China, the Indian Himalayan states of North and Northeast India and northern Pakistan.
WWF has identified the entire Eastern Himalayas as a priority Global 200 Ecoregion. Conservation International has upscaled the Eastern Himalaya hotspot to include all the eight states of Northeast India, along with the neighbouring countries of Bhutan, southern China and Myanmar.
The "river region" is characterized by fertile mountain valleys and includes the Yarlung Tsangpo River (the upper courses of the Brahmaputra) and its major tributary, the Nyang River, the Salween, the Yangtze, the Mekong, and the Yellow River. The Yarlung Tsangpo Canyon, formed by a horseshoe bend in the river where it flows around Namcha Barwa, is the deepest, and possibly longest canyon in the world. Among the mountains there are many narrow valleys. The valleys of Lhasa, Shigatse, Gyantse and the Brahmaputra are free from permafrost, covered with good soil and groves of trees, well irrigated, and richly cultivated.
The river region is characterised by fertile mountain valleys and includes the Yarlung Tsangpo River (the upper courses of the Brahmaputra) and its major tributary, the Nyang River, the Salween, the Yangtze, the Mekong, and the Yellow River. The Yarlung Tsangpo Canyon, formed by a horseshoe bend in the river where it flows around Namcha Barwa, is the deepest, and possibly longest canyon in the world. Among the mountains there are many narrow valleys. The valleys of Lhasa, Xigazê, Gyantse and the Brahmaputra are free from permafrost, covered with good soil and groves of trees, well irrigated, and richly cultivated.
Eastern Bengal and Assam had a total area of 111,569 sq m and was situated between 20° 45' and 28° 17' N., and between 87° 48' and 97° 5' E. It was bounded by Tibet and the Kingdom of Bhutan to the north, British Burma to the east and the Bay of Bengal to the south. Within these limits, were the princely states of Hill Tippera, Cooch Behar and Manipur.
The Andes or Andean Mountains () are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. This range is about long, about wide (widest between 18° south and 20° south latitude), and of an average height of about . The Andes extend from north to south through seven South American countries: Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina.
India is a country located in southern Asia. With over 1.3 billion people, India is the most populous democracy in the world. It is a federal constitutional republic governed under a parliamentary system consisting of 29
states and 7 union territories. All states, as well as the union territories of Puducherry and the National Capital Territory of Delhi, have elected legislatures and governments, both patterned on the Westminster model. The remaining five union territories are directly ruled by the centre through appointed administrators. In 1956, under the States Reorganisation Act, states were reorganised on a linguistic basis. Since then, their structure has remained largely unchanged. Each state or union territory is further divided into administrative districts..
Asia is the largest continent on Earth. It covers 9% of the Earth's total surface area (or 30% of its land area), and has the largest coastline, at . Asia is generally defined as comprising the eastern four-fifths of Eurasia. It is located to the east of the Suez Canal and the Ural Mountains, and south of the Caucasus Mountains (or the Kuma–Manych Depression) and the Caspian and Black Seas. It is bounded on the east by the Pacific Ocean, on the south by the Indian Ocean and on the north by the Arctic Ocean. Asia is subdivided into 48 countries, three of them (Russia, Kazakhstan and Turkey) having part of their land in Europe.
The Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon or Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon () or simply the Tsangpo Canyon, Brahmaputra Canyon or Tsangpo Gorge, along the Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet Autonomous Region, China, is the deepest canyon in the world, and at 504.6 km (314 miles) is slightly longer than the Grand Canyon in the United States, making it one of the world's largest. The Yarlung Tsangpo (Tibetan name for the upper course of the Brahmaputra) originates near Mount Kailash and runs east for about 1700 km, draining a northern section of the Himalayas before it enters the gorge just downstream of Pei, Tibet near the settlement of Zhibe. The canyon has a length of about 240 km (150 miles) as the gorge bends around Mount Namcha Barwa (7782 m) and cuts its way through the eastern Himalayan range. Its waters drop from about 2,900 m near Pei to about 1,500 m at the end of the Upper Gorge where the Po Tsangpo River enters. The river continues through the Lower Gorge to the Indian border at an elevation of 660 m. The river then enters Arunachal Pradesh and eventually becomes the Brahmaputra.
Most of the Bengal region lies in the Ganges-Brahmaputra delta, but there are highlands in its north, northeast and southeast. The Ganges Delta arises from the confluence of the rivers Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Meghna rivers and their respective tributaries. The total area of Bengal is 232,752  km—West Bengal is and Bangladesh .
India is a federal union comprising 29 states and 7 union territories, for a total of 36 entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into districts and smaller administrative divisions.
India is a federal union comprising 29 states and 7 union territories. All states, as well in addition to the union territories of Puducherry and the National Capital Territory of Delhi, have elected legislatures and governments following on the Westminster system of governance. The remaining five union territories are directly ruled by the centre through appointed administrators. In 1956, under the States Reorganisation Act, states were reorganised on a linguistic basis. Since then, their structure has remained largely unchanged. Each state or union territory is further divided into administrative districts. The districts are further divided into tehsils and ultimately into villages.
The population in the mountain regions of Nepal has exceeded the carrying capacity of the land. Therefore, people are moving to the more arable lands of the Terai. It is estimated that 60% of Nepal’s population is concentrated in the hill and mountain regions, while 60% of farmland is in the Terai (Shrestha). The migrants hope to make a better life for themselves by moving to the agricultural hub of the country. However, these migrants are having difficulty finding affordable land.
The largest mountain ranges are the Andes and Rocky Mountains. The Sierra Nevada and the Cascade Range reach similar altitudes as the Rocky Mountains, but are significantly smaller. In North America, the greatest number of fourteeners are in the United States, and more specifically in the U.S. state of Colorado. The highest peaks of the Americas are located in the Andes, with Aconcagua of Argentina being the highest; in North America Denali (Mount McKinley) in the U.S. state of Alaska is the tallest.
China has the longest combined land border in the world, measuring from the mouth of the Yalu River to the Gulf of Tonkin. China borders 14 nations, more than any other country except Russia, which also borders 14. China extends across much of East Asia, bordering Vietnam, Laos, and Myanmar (Burma) in Southeast Asia; India, Bhutan, Nepal, Afghanistan, and Pakistan in South Asia; Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan in Central Asia; and Russia, Mongolia, and North Korea in Inner Asia and Northeast Asia. Additionally, China shares maritime boundaries with South Korea, Japan, Vietnam, and the Philippines.
The gorge separates the major peaks of Dhaulagiri () on the west and Annapurna () on the east. If one measures the depth of a canyon by the difference between the river height and the heights of the highest peaks on either side, the gorge is the world's deepest. The portion of the river directly between Dhaulagiri and Annapurna I (7 km downstream from Tukuche) is at an elevation of , lower than Annapurna I. As tectonic activity forced the mountains higher, the river cut down through the uplift. This region is known for shaligram fossils, revered as one of five non-living forms of Lord Vishnu.
This concept is based on the boundaries of the Balkan peninsula. The countries that have been described as being entirely within the region are: Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Macedonia and Montenegro.
India is divided into 29 states (further subdivided into districts) and 7 union territories including The National capital territory (I.e., Delhi).
India's borders run a total length of .
The Andes are the longest mountain range on Earth, extending from the Tierra del Fuego archipelago in southernmost South America to Venezuela in the north. In southern Peru, the Andes consist of several mountain chains including the Western Cordillera and the Eastern Cordillera, with elevations of up to , which are separated from each other by the Altiplano.
Kazakhstan is located in Central Asia and Eastern Europe at . With an area of about 2,724,800 square kilometers, Kazakhstan is more than twice the combined size of the other four Central Asian states and 60% larger than Alaska. The country borders Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan to the south; Russia to the north; Russia and the Caspian Sea to the west; and China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region to the east.
The capital and largest city is Lahore which was the historical capital of the wider Punjab region. Other important cities include Faisalabad, Rawalpindi, Gujranwala, Sargodha, Multan, Sialkot, Bahawalpur, Gujrat, Sheikhupura, Jhelum and Sahiwal. The undivided Punjab region was home to six rivers, of which five flow through Pakistan's Punjab province. From west to east, the rivers are: the Indus, Jhelum, Beas, Chenab, Ravi and Sutlej. It is the nation's only province that touches every other province; it also surrounds the federal enclave of the national capital city at Islamabad. In the acronym "P-A-K-I-S-T-A-N", the P is for "Punjab".
The Indian Himalayan Region (IHR) is the section of the Himalayas within India, spanning 10 Indian states (administrative regions) namely, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, and hill regions of 2 states viz. Assam and West Bengal of Indian Republic. The region is responsible for providing water to a large part of the Indian subcontinent and contains various flora and fauna.
The next Himalayan Indian state, Himachal Pradesh, it is noted for its hill stations, particularly Shimla, the summer capital of the British Raj, and Dharmasala, the centre of the Tibetan community in exile in India. This area marks the start of the Punjab Himalaya and the Sutlej river, the most easterly of the five tributaries of the Indus, cuts through the range here. Further west, the Himalayas form most of the southern portion of the Indian State of Jammu & Kashmir. The twin peaks of Nun Kun are the only mountains over in this part of the Himalayas. Beyond lies the renown Kashmir Valley and the town and lakes of Srinagar. Finally, the Himalayas cross the Line of Control into Pakistan and reach their western end in the dramatic 8000 m peak of Nanga Parbat, which rises over above the Indus valley and is the most westerly of the 8000 m summits.
The Ganges basin ranges from the Himalaya and the Transhimalaya in the north, to the northern slopes of the Vindhya range in the south, from the eastern slopes of the Aravalli in the west to the Chota Nagpur plateau and the Sunderbans delta in the east. A significant portion of the discharge from the Ganges comes from the Himalayan mountain system. Within the Himalaya, the Ganges basin spreads almost 1,200 km from the Yamuna-Satluj divide along the Simla ridge forming the boundary with the Indus basin in the west to the Singalila Ridge along the Nepal-Sikkim border forming the boundary with the Brahmaputra basin in the east. This section of the Himalaya contains 9 of the 14 highest peaks in the world over 8,000m in height, including Mount Everest which is the high point of the Ganges basin. The other peaks over 8,000m in the basin are Kangchenjunga, Lhotse, Makalu, Cho Oyu, Dhaulagiri, Manaslu, Annapurna and Shishapangma. The Himalayan portion of the basin includes the south-eastern portion of the state of Himachal Pradesh, the entire state of Uttarakhand, the entire country of Nepal and the extreme north-western portion of the state of West Bengal.
Geographically, the Himalayan states lie in the Indian subcontinent. The countries and territories include:The main religions in the Himalayas are Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam. Some of the important religious places in the Himalayas are: