35 million years ago the Tethyan oceanic lithosphere between Asia and India was consumed and the two continents had begun to collide. Because the two colliding continents are of similar buoyancy the subduction ceased. Instead continental rocks were brought up to the surface by great thrust faults causing crustal thickening and the rise of the Himalayan mountain belt. Some of the Tethys oceanic crust and sediments were caught up and squeezed in the collision zone and the two continents became sutured together. The fast uplift allowed massive erosion to remove large amount of bedrock to be deposited as collision-related Molasse sediments in the foreland basin of the mountain belt.