The Miocene fossil lizards from Kutch (Gujarat), India: a rare window to the past diversity of this subcontinent

Abstract

The Miocene beds of Kutch in India are well known for their mammalian assemblages, including the extinct ape Sivapithecus, but far less is known about the fossil squamates from this area. Although India with its over 800 reptile species is recognized as one of the global biodiversity hotspots, knowledge of past diversity and paleobiogeography of squamates on this subcontinent is very limited. We here report on new lizard finds, which have been recovered from two stratigraphic levels: the older Palasava locality (dated to the middle Miocene, ca. 14 Ma) and the younger Tapar site (late Miocene, ca. 11–10 Ma). Although fragmentarily preserved, the material described here sheds important light on the composition and paleobiogeography of squamates during the Miocene in South Asia. The older Palasava locality contains cf. Uromastyx s.l. and Varanus sp., the latter representing the oldest record of this taxon in the region of India south of the Himalayas and its occurrence here suggests a mean annual temperature not less than 15°C. The material from the younger Tapar locality consists of an unidentified acrodontan lizard, here questionably placed in agamids, and a skink. The latter shows a resemblance to mabuyines, however, the fragmentary nature of the material does not allow a precise allocation without doubts. The cosmopolitan mabuyines have been suggested to have their origin in Asia, so the potential presence of mabuyines in the Tapar locality might represent the first, but putative, Asian evidence of the occurrence of this group in the Miocene.

The first report of cf.Zygolophodon(Mammalia, Proboscidea, Mammutidae) from the Upper Miocene of Kutch, India

“…While fossils from the Siwalik Group in the northern part of the basin have been extensively studied (Flynn et al, 2013(Flynn et al, , 2016Nanda, 2015), fossil deposits from the southern arm, which extends into the western Indian state of Gujarat and Sindh province of Pakistan, have received comparatively little attention despite being known since the 19th century (Falconer, 1845;Lydekker, 1876Lydekker, , 1885Pilgrim, 1908;von Meyer, 1865). Recent explorations in Kutch, in Gujarat, India have yielded diverse terrestrial fossil assemblages that range in age from the Middle to the Upper Miocene (Bhandari et al, 2010(Bhandari et al, , 2015C ̌ernǎnský et al, 2022;Kapur et al, 2021;Singh et al, 2021Singh et al, , 2022van der Made et al, 2022).…”

“…11.0–10.0 Ma) localities of Tapar (Tappar) and Pasuda (Bhandari et al, 2010, 2018; Patnaik et al, 2022; Singh et al, 2020; van der Made et al, 2022). The fossil vertebrate assemblage from Tapar is diverse and includes fish (Singh et al, 2019), squamates (Čerňǎnský et al, 2022; Singh et al, 2021), and mammals (Bhandari et al, 2010, 2015, 2018; Patnaik et al, 2022; Singh et al, 2020).…”