Gully erosion, which is the rapid incision of soils by concentrated overland and/or subsurface runoff, affects India widely. However, Central and Western India suffer from particularly intense land degradation as prolonged gullying has resulted in the formation of extensive badlands therein. Considerable research has been conducted on these badlands, but drivers and characteristics of gully erosion in other regions suffering from widespread gullying are unknown. Employing cluster and hotspot analyses using a novel spatial database of India‧s gully landforms, this study provides a regional synthesis of gully erosion in India. Different sets of variables were found to control the spatial patterns of the various gully erosion landforms in India, and analytical results were synthesised using India‧s physiographic divisions to identify and delineate six major gully‐affected regions across the country, namely, Eastern Uplands, Deccan Uplands, Yamuna Basin, Rajasthan Uplands, Gujarat Plains, and Kachchh. Although gully erosion in the Eastern Uplands was triggered by extensive deforestation in the previous centuries, it remains an active geomorphic phenomenon in this part of India, similar to the Kachchh region in Western India. Contrastingly, gully erosion features of the Deccan exhibit very little to no activity at the present. Not only does this study refute the popular belief that the only hotspots of gully erosion in India are the badlands of Central and Western India, but it also provides useful guidance for future regional and local gully erosion studies, besides adding to the knowledge base of Indian physical geography and potentially aiding in regional land management planning.
Majhi et al. (Fri,) studied this question.