Laccadives, Maldives and Chagos Islands

• The Laccadives, Maldives and Chagos Islands are located in the Indian Ocean to the southwest of India and Sri Lanka.
• Sri Lanka was known to the Romans as Taprobane and these islands as the ‘Twelve Thousand Islands’.

Sources

1. According to Pliny the Elder (23-79 CE), the inhabitants did not use the stars when navigating to them.
2. They are mentioned in the first century CE document, the Periplus of the Erythraen Sea.

Laccadives

• The Laccadives are called the ‘Lakshadweep’ which means ‘one hundred thousand islands’ in Sanskrit, Hindi and Tamil. The most southerly island is Minicoy.

Maldives

• The Maldives are separated from the Laccadives by the Eight Degree Channel on the 8 degree N Parallel of Latitude, which is south of Minicoy. North of Minicoy lies the Nine Degree Channel.

Chagos

• The Chagos islands consist of 60 islands, and are situated 310 miles (500km) south of the Maldives, on the Chagos-Laccadive Ridge.

The Andaman and Nicobar Islands

• These consist of 572 islands and are located in the east of the Bay of Bengal. They form the western edge of the Andaman Sea with Burma, Thailand and the Malay peninsular to the east.

• The two island groups are separated by the Ten Degree Channel on the 10 degree North Parallel of Latitude.