Tectonic significance of the young mineral dates and the rates of cooling and uplift in the Himalaya

More than two-thirds of the published K-Ar, Rb-Sr and fission-track mineral dates from the Himalaya lie in the 5–75 m.y. range as a result of metamorphic overprint, uplift and cooling during the Late Cretaceous—Tertiary Himalayan orogeny. In contrast, the few but almost invariably old, Rb-Sr whole-rock ages reveal pre-Tertiary magmaticmetamorphic events.The pattern of distribution of these young dates vis-á-vis geological evidence reveals three phases, of the Himalayan orogeny, viz.: (1) folding and metamorphism (50–75 m.y.); (2) uplift (25–40 m.y.); and (3) major uplift, thrusting, formation of nappe structures, mylonitization and regional retrogression. The maximum concentration of dates in the 10–25 m.y. period marks this paroxysmal phase of the Himalayan orogeny.The Rb-Sr dates of co-existing muscovites and biotites have been used to compute the rates of cooling and uplift. Thus, slow cooling at the rate of about 4°C m.y.⁻¹ from 50 to 25 m.y. and rapid cooling at the rate of 19°-21°C m.y.⁻ from 25 m.y. to present have been inferred. The high rate of cooling over the past 25 m.y. is the result of major uplift at the rate of 0.7–0.8 mm yr⁻¹, which is in conformity with the current rate of uplift obtained from geodetic survey.