Otostigmus poonamae Khanna & Tripathi 1986

Otostigmus poonamae Khanna & Tripathi, 1986

O. poonamae Khanna & Tripathi, 1986: 38, Figs 1 –6. Himachal Pradesh, India. O. poonamae: Khanna, 2008, 39 (in list).

Remarks. Khanna & Tripathi (1986) characterise the genus Otostigmus primarily as possessing nine pairs of oval unoperculate spiracles and head overlapped posteriorly by tergite 1. However, their Fig. 1 shows the cephalic plate overlapping tergite 1 as, for example, in Scolopendra. Another character seen in Scolopendra but not Otostigmus is the spined ultimate leg prefemoral process. The authors describe tergites 20 and 21 as having a median sulcus but these would appear from their Fig.5 to be sutures, not seen in Otostigmus but present on T 21 in some Scolopendra species. However, the basal 2½–2 2/3 antennal articles are glabrous in O. poonamae as in many Otostigmus species (in Scolopendra the basal four or more articles are glabrous).

Clearly O. poonamae is quite unlike other Otostigmus species. I suspect that it is a Scolopendra and regard it as a nomen dubium.