Fault plane solutions of shallow earthquakes and contemporary tectonics in Asia

The tectonics of Asia are interpreted as a result of convergence of the Indian and Eurasian plates. The Indian shield bends down and underthrusts the Himalayas to the northeast along a shallow dipping fault plane while the Eurasian plate underthrusts the Pamir mountains, and therefore presumably the Indian Plate, to the south. The convergence of the Indian and Eurasian plates appears to cause relatively high stress to be transmitted across a broad area, north and east of the Himalayas, and this stress in turn causes earthquakes and renewed tectonic activity in some of the ancient Paleozoic and Mesozoic fold belts that separate more stable, aseismic blocks in Asia.