Precambrian • Neoproterozoic In GSP lexicon

Salkhala Formation

Late Precambrian (Neoproterozoic)

Cited in 8 sources Last reviewed Aug 2, 2026

Unit summary

Rank: Not recorded
Status: Published
Age: Precambrian · NeoproterozoicLate Precambrian (Neoproterozoic)
Named by: Wadia, in Pascoe (1929), as the 'Salkhala Series'
Type locality: Salkhala village, Kishanganga River, Kashmir34.5850°N, 73.7300°E
Thickness: 3000+ m
Lithology: Schist, phyllite, quartzite, carbonaceous material, marble
Synonyms: Salkhala Series

A thick Late Precambrian (Neoproterozoic) high-grade metamorphic sequence of schist, phyllite, quartzite and marble in the Kashmir Himalaya, named after Salkhala village on the Kishanganga River and broadly equivalent to the Hazara Formation.

Named after Salkhala village on Kishanganga River, Kashmir. Equivalent to Hazara Formation. High-grade metamorphic sequence with graphitic horizons.

Fossils

Not recorded

Contacts

In the Azad Kashmir column

LimestoneMetamorphicMixedFossils recordedUnconformityContact not recorded

Band colour = period; texture = dominant rock type. Lines between bands mark the contact type (wavy = unconformity inferred from a missing period); dotted = no contact recorded in the sources (not a claim of conformity). True scale makes height ∝ recorded thickness; hatched = thickness not recorded. Ages approximate, for ordering.

This unit (highlighted) within its province column; faded ends continue above and below. Line style marks the contact type.

Distribution & setting

Azad Kashmir

Basin: Not recorded
Region: Not recorded
Depositional environment: Not recorded
Coordinates: 34.5850°N, 73.7300°E

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Correlation

Not recorded. Compare this unit against other basins on the correlation panel →

Economic significance

Not recorded

Remarks

One of the oldest metasedimentary successions of the Kashmir Lesser Himalaya, carrying graphitic (carbonaceous) horizons; regarded as part of the reworked Indian-plate cover and correlated with the Hazara Formation.

Research notes (5)

Field-by-field findings drawn from the cited literature. Every statement is traced to a registered source — follow a citation for the full reference.

Name & nomenclature (1)

Attested in Shah (2009), Geological Survey of Pakistan Memoir 22 - the Stratigraphic Committee of Pakistan's compiled lexicon (listed in the memoir's contents). Adds the definitional GSP/SCP lexicon citation.

Shah, S.M.I. (2009)

Age & correlation (1)

DiPietro & Pogue (2004): the Salkhala Formation is Lower Proterozoic, an unknown thickness of chlorite- to garnet-grade pelitic schist, marble and graphitic schist intruded by ~500 Ma pegmatite, correlated with the Lesser Himalayan sequence south of the Batal fault.

DiPietro, J.A. & Pogue, K.R. (2004)

Lithology (2)

Calkins et al. (1975): in the Hazara region the Salkhala Formation — the oldest known rocks — consists largely of quartz (mica-chlorite) schist, fine-grained thin-bedded marble (locally graphitic or tremolitic), sooty graphite schist and augen-bearing quartzo-feldspathic gneiss; it crops out around the apex of the Hazara–Kashmir syntaxis and along the Indus from Tarbela to Kandar. Named after Salkhala village on the Kishanganga (Neelum) River; at the type locality it is overlain by the Dogra Slates (equated with the Hazara Formation) and closely resembles the Jutogh Series of Simla.

Calkins, J.A., Offield, T.W., Abdullah, S.K.M. & Ali, S.T. (1975)
In the Kaghan Valley the northernmost (oldest) rocks are correlated with the Sharda Group / Salkhala: Naran garnetiferous calc-pelitic and graphitic gneisses with the sheet-like Saiful Maluk Granite and Dharir migmatites (advanced anatexis) at staurolite–kyanite grade (Ghazanfar & Chaudhry, 1985).

Ghazanfar, M. & Chaudhry, M.N. (1985)

Geological significance (1)

Kazmi & Jan (1997): the Salkhala Formation (the 'Salkhala Series' of Wadia 1930; type locality Salkhala village on the Kishanganga River, Kashmir) is a Proterozoic greenschist-facies sequence of slates, phyllites and schists with intercalated marble, quartzite and graphite, distributed in a band around the Hazara–Kashmir Syntaxis. On the eastern limb of the syntaxis it overlies the Permian Panjal Volcanics along the Panjal Thrust, and in the southern Nanga Parbat Massif it is thrust over the 1,800–2,700 Ma Nanga Parbat Gneisses along the Shontargali Thrust (an MCT analogue); at its type locality it is overlain by the Dogra Slate (correlated with the Hazara Formation). Most workers assign the Kaghan Group to the Salkhala Formation.

Kazmi, A.H. & Jan, M.Q. (1997)

Sources (6)

Malkani, M.S. & Mahmood, Z. (2017). Stratigraphy of Pakistan. Geological Survey of Pakistan, Memoir Vol. 24.
OpenStreetMap contributors and GEOnet Names Server (public geographic gazetteers), used to geolocate named GSP type localities to approximate decimal coordinates.
Shah, S.M.I. (2009). Stratigraphy of Pakistan. Geological Survey of Pakistan, Memoir Vol. 22.
Kazmi, A.H. & Jan, M.Q. (1997). Geology and Tectonics of Pakistan. Graphic Publishers, Karachi.
Kazmi, A.H. & Abbasi, I.A. (2008). Stratigraphy and Historical Geology of Pakistan. Department & National Centre of Excellence in Geology, University of Peshawar, Peshawar. 524 pp. ISBN 978-969-9119.
Calkins, J.A., Offield, T.W., Abdullah, S.K.M. & Ali, S.T. (1975). Geology of the southern Himalaya in Hazara, Pakistan, and adjacent areas. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 716-C, 29 p. (Geological Investigations in Pakistan).

Reviewer confidence: medium

Every fact on this page is source-cited. This entry is part of the peer-archived Pakistan Stratigraphy Dataset (doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991, CC‑BY‑4.0).

Lexicon status: Name attested in the Shah (1977/2009) Geological Survey of Pakistan compilation — the national stratigraphic lexicon. This records where the name is documented; it is not an endorsement of the unit’s definition, age or figures.

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Cite this unit

APA

Qudsi, L. (2026). Salkhala Formation. In Pakistan Stratigraphy Dataset [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991

BibTeX

@misc{stratigraphypk_salkhalaformation,
  author    = {Qudsi, Lareb},
  title     = {{Salkhala Formation} --- Pakistan Stratigraphy Dataset},
  year      = {2026},
  publisher = {Zenodo},
  doi       = {10.5281/zenodo.21363991},
  url       = {https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991}
}

Archived dataset: doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991 (CC‑BY‑4.0) · Direct link to this entry: https://stratigraphy.pk/formation/salkhala-formation (accessed October 29, 2026).

To cite the unit's original definition instead, see: Wadia, in Pascoe (1929), as the 'Salkhala Series'.