The India or Indian Plate is a minor tectonic plate. It was originally a part of the ancient continent of Gondwanaland from which it split off, eventually becoming a major plate. About 50 to 55 million years ago, it fused with the adjacent Australian Plate. It is today part of the major Indo-Australian Plate, and includes the subcontinent of India and a portion of the basin under the Indian Ocean.
About 90 million years ago, subsequent to the splitting off from Gondwanaland of both Madagascar and India, the India Plate split from Madagascar in the late Cretaceous Period. It began moving north, at about 20 cm/yr (8 in/yr) releases/2007-10/haog-tfc101507.php" target="_blank">http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-10/haog-tfc101507.php, and began colliding with _Asia between 50 and 55 million years ago, in the Eocene epoch of the Cenozoic Era. During this time, the India Plate covered a distance of 2,000 to 3,000 km (1,200 to 1,900 mi), and moved faster than any other known plate. In 2007, German geologists determined that the reason the India Plate moved so quickly is that it is only half as thick as the other plates which formerly constituted Gondwanaland. releases/2007-10/haog-tfc101507.php" target="_blank">http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-10/haog-tfc101507.php
The collision with the _Eurasian Plate along the boundary between India and Nepal formed the orogenic belt that created the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalaya Mountains, as sediment bunched up like earth before a plow.
The India Plate is currently moving northeast at 5 cm/yr (2 in/yr), while the Eurasian Plate is moving north at only 2 cm/yr (0.8 in/yr). This is causing the Eurasian Plate to deform, and the India Plate to compress at a rate of 4 mm/yr (0.15 in/yr).
