Late Cretaceous ophiolite obduction and Paleocene India-Asia collision in the westernmost Himalaya

Abstract

Collision of the Kohistan island arc with Asia at ~100 Ma resulted in N-S compression within the Neo-Tethys at a spreading center north of the Indo-Pakistani craton. Subsequent India-Asia convergence converted the Neo-Tethyan spreading center into a short-lived subduction zone. The hanging wall of the subduction zone became the Waziristan, Khost and Jalalabad igneous complexes. During the Santonian- Campanian (late Cretaceous), thrusting of the NW IndoPakistani craton beneath Albian oceanic crust and a Cenomanian volcano-sedimentary complex, generated an ophiolite-radiolarite belt. Ophiolite obduction resulted in tectonic loading and flexural subsidence of the NW Indian margin and sub-CCD deposition of shelf-derived olistostromes and turbidites in the foredeep. Campanian-Maastriehtian calci- clastic and siliciclastic sediment gravity flows derived from both margins filled the foredeep as a huge allochthon of Triassic-Jurassic rise and slope strata was thrust ahead of the ophiolites onto the Indo-Pakistani craton. Shallow to intermediate marine strata covered the foredeep during the late Maastrichtian. As ophiolite obduction neared completion during the Maastrichtian, the majority of India-Asia convergence was accommodated along the southern margin of Asia. During the Paleocene, India was thrust beneath a second allochthon that included open marine middle Maastrichtian colored mélange which represents the Asian Makran-Indus-Tsangpo accretionary prism. Latérites that formed on the eroded ophiolites and structurally higher colored mélange during the Paleocene wei’e unconformably overlapped by upper Paleocene and Middle Eocene shallow marine limestone and shale that delineate distinct episodes of Paleocene collisional and Early Eocene post-collisional deformation.