The Chitarwata Formation is a geological formation in western Pakistan, made up of Oligocene and early Miocene terrestrial fluvial facies. The sediments were deposited in coastal depositional environments (estuarine, strandplain and tidal flats) when Pakistan was partly covered by the Tethys Ocean. Paleomagnetic data indicates an age range of around 28 to 17 million years ago, with its base in the Oligocene, and its upper boundary, where it meets the overlying Vihowa Formation, of the Early Miocene. Together with the Vihowa Formation, the Chitarwata Formation records the sedimentation of the Himalayan foreland basin during the collision of the Indian and Asian tectonic plates, the transition from marginal marine to fluvial environments, and the rise of the Himalayas. Fossil content The Chitarwata Formation has provided a wealth of terrestrial mammal fossils of the late Paleogene and early Neogene, or Tabenbulakian; the last of the Asian land mammal ages (ALMA). Among many others, the following fossils are reported from the formation: Mammals Anthracotherium adiposum, A. bugtiense, A. silistrense Asiadelphis akbarbugtii Atavocricetodon paaliense Baluchimys barryi, B. chaudryi, B. ganeshapher Brachypotherium fatehjangense Bugtilemur mathesoni Bugtimeryx pilgrimi Bugtimys zafarullahi Bugtipithecus inexpectans Bugtitherium grandincisivum Buzdartherium gulkirao Downsimys margolesi, D. margolisi Fallomus ginsburgi, F. quraishyi, F. razae Guangxilemur singsilai Hodsahibia azrae, H. beamshaiensis, H. gracilis Lindsaya derabugtiensis Lophibaluchia pilbeami Lophiomeryx kargilensis Microbunodon silistrense Nalameryx savagei, N. sulaimani Paalitherium gurki Parabrachyodus hyopotamoides Paraceratherium bugtiense Paraentelodon sp. Phileosimias brahuiorum, P. kamali Primus cheemai Prokanisamys arifi Progiraffa exigua Pseudocricetodon nawabi Sivameryx palaeindicus Spanocricetodon sulaiman Zindapiria quadricollis Deinotherium sp. Reptiles Astorgosuchus bugtiensis Fish Carcharhinus balochenisis, C. perseus Cretolamna twiggensis Hemiprisris heteropleurus Nebrius obliquum References Further reading S. Adnet, P. -O. Antoine, S. R. Hassan Baqri, J. Crochet, L. Marivaux, J. Welcomme, and G. Métais. 2007. New tropical carcharhinids (chondrichthyes, Carcharhiniformes) from the late Eocene–early Oligocene of Balochistan, Pakistan: Paleoenvironmental and paleogeographic implications. Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 30(2):303-323 G. Métais, P.-O. Antoine, S. R. H. Baqri, M. Benammi, J.-Y. Crochet, D. Franceschi, L. Marivaux and J.-L. Welcomme. 2006. New remains of the enigmatic cetartiodactyl Bugtitherium grandincisivum Pilgrim, 1908, from the upper Oligocene of the Bugti Hills (Balochistan, Pakistan). Naturwissenschaften 93(7):348-355 E. H. Lindsay, L. J. Flynn, I. U. Cheema, J. C. Barry, K. Downing, A. R. Rajpar, and S. M. Raza. 2005. Will Downs and the Zinda Pir Dome. Palaeontologia Electronica 8(1):19A:1-18 L. Marivaux, P.-O. Antoine, S. R. H. Baqri, M. Benammi, and Y. Chaimanee. 2005. Anthropoid primates from the Oligocene