Priceless 2.6-million-year-old fossils up for sale

A set of priceless fossils dating back to millions of years (rare discoveries for researchers) are on sale for a few thousand rupees at Masol, a small village in Punjab about 18-km from Chandigarh in northern India.

Reports say Times of India recently bought a skull of a ‘hemibos’, a 2.6-million-year-old predecessor of the present-day wild water buffalo, for just Rs 4,500 from a family in Masol, following reports that fossilised rocks found near the village were being illegally sold for prices as low as Rs 150.

Read also: World’s most powerful rocket tested by NASA

Last year, a paper in a French journal, Comptes Rendus, claimed that cut marks on fossilised bones found in Masol were a proof of Hominin (early man) activities dating back 2.6 million years, and researchers could take years to find an entire skull as such fossils break due to the movement of tectonic plates.

Rajeev Patnaik, an expert in vertebrate palaeontology at Punjab University’s geology department, said the skull, with its upper jaw still intact, was priceless because there are only 14 of its kind in the world. Patnaik said it was sheer luck to find a fossil like the one TOI had bought from the village.

RipplesNigeria ….without borders, without fears

Click here to download the Ripples Nigeria App for latest updates

Join the conversation

Opinions

Support Ripples Nigeria, hold up solutions journalism

Balanced, fearless journalism driven by data comes at huge financial costs.

As a media platform, we hold leadership accountable and will not trade the right to press freedom and free speech for a piece of cake.

If you like what we do, and are ready to uphold solutions journalism, kindly donate to the Ripples Nigeria cause.

Your support would help to ensure that citizens and institutions continue to have free access to credible and reliable information for societal development.

Donate Now