Indian Tertiary angiosperm pollen: A critical assessment

Abstract

More than 400 genera and 1000 species of angiosperm pollen are known from the Tertiary sediments of India. It has been observed that large numbers of these taxa are based on one or few specimens and meagre morphological differentiation. Thus, their usefulness is limited, Thanikaimoni et al., (1984) and Venkatachala et al., (989), in an effort to distinguish important stratigraphic and environmental markers, selected several taxa and illustrated, discussed and compared them with the African pollen. In continuation, holotypes, paratypes and other specimens of selected species available at the repository of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, Lucknow have been restudied, critically evaluated and their morphological limits circumscribed to make them more useful and applicable for age determination and stratigraphic correlation as well as for Palaeoenvironmental interpretation with emphasis on their affinity with extant taxa.