Variations in ornamentation of wings and palpi of Anopheles (Cellia) subpictus Grassi collected from northwest India.

An. subpictus Grassi is a dominant species in Haryana and Uttaranchal states. Though it is a non-vector species but recently infected specimens with malarial parasite have been reported from India, Indonesia and Java1. This species is distributed throughout India, Afghanistan, Borneo, China, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Java and Indonesia. Morphological variations have been recorded in Indian anophelines since 1933. Christophers2 first recorded the variations from type form in genus Anopheles Meigen. It was followed by Ramakrishna3 and Rehman et al4, who observed an extra dark band on the palpi of female An. fluviatilis James. An extra dark band on the palpi in An. subpictus Grassi and An. pallidus Theobald was observed by Subramanian & Nagendra5. Incomplete development of anal vein in An. stephensi Liston was noted by Bhatnagar et al6 Rajagopal & Chakraborty7 recorded variations in the palpi, hind tarsi and wings of An. annularis Van der Wulp from Dhanbad. Nagpal & Sharma8,9 recorded variation in wings and palpi of An. vagus Donitz and variations in palpi of An. sundaicus Rodenwaldt. Nagpal10 reported morphological variations in An. stephensi Liston. From the above it becomes crystal clear that no worker recorded variations in palpi and wings of An. subpictus Grassi except Subramanian and Nagendra5, who reported single variation in palpi of this species. However, the present authors have been able to record 10 types of morphological variations in wings and palpi of An. subpictus from field collected specimens. These variations have been described and illustrated in the present paper.