Auden took an interest in the Vindhyan formations of the Himalayas and lectured on glaciers at The Himalayan Club in 1936. His exploration and mapping (with three other climbers) of the high Karakoram and Anghil region of the Himalayas was the subject of Eric Shipton's Blank on the Map (1938). In 1929 he visited his younger brother Wystan in Berlin and talked to him about K2 which served as inspiration for a play, The Ascent of F6. One of Auden's early interests was in the Krol Belts. This early stratigraphy work in the mid 1930s on the Himalayas was however something he could not continue work on after moving into economic geology following the war. He noted significantly that Aravalli strikes found locally in rock structures in the Garhwal Himalaya /.. suggests a northward extension of Peninsular rocks into the Himalaya. In 1940 he was elected president of the Geological Institute of Presidency College, Calcutta. In 1937 Auden learned to pilot an aircraft and conducted an aerial survey of the Bijaigarh shales. In 1945-51, he was engaged in investigating all the major dam sites, hydro electric projects, irrigation works and water supply schemes of India. He became an acclaimed expert on groundwater in the Kutch and Rajasthan region.