India was home to a variety of sea cows millions of years ago, only one variety survives now: Study

A study done by IIT Roorkee on sea animals and mammals like whales and sea cows has found that India was home to at least four varieties of sea cows, or dugongs -- an endangered species of herbivorous marine mammals — some 34 to 56 million years ago during the geological period called Eocene epoch. “Only one of these varieties survives in India’s marine waters currently although there was an amazing diversity of these creatures in India in the prehistoric past,” said Sunil Bajpai, professor at department of earth sciences, IIT-R, who has authored the study along with his students. He added that India in recent years has contributed significantly to the research on the Order Sirenia (sea cows) using traces of fossils (mostly skulls) found from the country’s oceans, especially Kutch in Gujarat. Presently, the sea cow population in the country is concentrated in the Gulf of Kutch, the Gulf of Mannar, Palk Bay (Tamil Nadu) and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands