Fossil lizards from the Deccan intertrappean beds (latest Cretaceous / earliest Paleocene) of lower Narmada basin, Malwa Plateau, India

We here report on the first lizard fossils from the Deccan intertrappean strata (latest Cretaceous/Palaeocene) exposed at Kesavi, District Dhar in the Malwa Plateau of lower Narmada Valley, central India. The material is only fragmentary, but tentatively three tooth morphotypes of non-acrodontan lizards can be identified. Besides these, two oblong osteoderms, resembling paramacellodid osteoderms, are described as Squamata indet. The 4(th) isolated tooth is questionably referred to Squamata. Although the intertrappean deposits of the Deccan volcanic province have been explored for over three decades, lizards are scarce and many aspects remain unclear. However, the tentative absence of agamids in Kesavi and other localities yielding pre-Eocene deposits (e.g., Naskal and Kisalpuri) appears to be interesting, because a high diversity of agamids has been reported from early Eocene localities of India. There is, in contrast, a total absence of non-acrodontan lizards. The contrast between pre-Eocene and Eocene localities seems to be puzzling in the context of India's supposed physical isolation from Asia during this time. Only future researches can shed light on that. Although the material described here brings only limited new insight, it supports that non-acrodontan lizards were present in India during the latest Cretaceous/earliest Palaeocene.