The Permian–Triassic palynological transition in the Guryul Ravine section, Kashmir, India: implications for Tethyan–Gondwanan correlations

This first palynological study of the Permian–Triassic succession in the Guryul Ravine, Kashmir, India, reveals impoverished latest Permian spore-pollen assemblages in the uppermost Zewan Formation, a rich palynoassemblage from the basal Khunamuh Formation characteristic of the Permian–Triassic transition zone and depleted Triassic assemblages from higher in the Khunamuh Formation. The collective assemblages can be broadly correlated to the Densipollenites magnicorpus and Klausipollenites decipiens palynozones of peninsular India and to palynofloras spanning the Permian–Triassic boundary elsewhere in Gondwana. Generally, low spore-pollen yields and poor preservational quality of the studied assemblages hinder more precise correlations and are inferred to be a function of an offshore marine depositional setting on the margin of the Neotethys Ocean, and thermal alteration associated with Cenozoic collisional tectonism between India and Asia.

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