Amini, India

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about Amini, the census town and island in India. For other uses, see Amini.

?Amini Lakshadweep • India
Coordinates: (find coordinates)
Time zone	IST (UTC+5:30)
District(s)	Lakshadweep
Population	7,340 (2001)

Amini is a census town in the Union Territory of Lakshadweep, India, at 11°06′N, 72°45′E. It is also the name of the island upon which the town stands, and of the atoll which contains that island.

1 The island
2 The town
3 References
4 External links

[edit] The island

The island has a post office and a hospital. The channel between Amini Island and Cardamum Island is safe and deep, but depths of less than 10m project 0.5 mile S from the S tip of the reefs surrounding Cardamum Island. Amini Island Light is shown on the S point of the island. The village is in the middle of the W side of the Island. A raised stone platform, with steps leading to the beach, is in front of the village.

Amini Island, the most important of the Amindivi Islands, is oval in shape, with the long axis oriented northeast-southwest. It is 2.9 km long and up to 1.2 km wide, yielding a land area of 2.59 km². It is fringed by a reef 0.3 to 0.6 km wide.

Amini Island lies at the northeastern extremity of Pitti Bank, 42 km from small uninhabited Pitti Island (not to be confused with Pitti Islet of Kalpeni Atoll), which is located at the opposite southwestern extremity of the bank. Pitti Bank, also oriented along a northeast-southwest axis, is 49 km long, in the northern part from 2 to 7 km wide, and in the southern part up to 18 km wide. Pitti Bank may be considered a largely submerged and sunken atoll, with an estimated lagoon area officially given as 155.09 km² (but apparently at least double that amount), with just the two islands Amini and Pitti remaining at its opposite ends. Kadmat island, although just 5 km northeast of Amini Island, is separated from it by a deep channel and thus forms a separate geographical unit.

Amini Island was one of the first islands in the archipelago to be inhabited. The artistans on this island are known for making walking sticks out of coconut shells and tortoise shells as well as carved stone and coral motifs.

[edit] The town

The village (census town) of Amini is located in the middle of the west coast. A raised stone platform, with steps leading to the beach, is in front of the village. As of 2001 India census,^[1] the town of Amini had a population of 7340. Males constitute 51% of the population and females 49%. Amini has an average literacy rate of 71%, higher than the national average of 59.5%; with 55% of the males and 45% of females literate. 15% of the population is under 6 years of age.