Abstract
Sirsa river runs through the central part of the Baddi Barotiwala Nalagarh (BBN) industrial region in district Solan of Himachal Pradesh. The water of this river is used for irrigating agricultural fields by the farmers. The increased industrial and urbanization activities in the valley are being pointed out as the cause of river water pollution by the farmers and other habitations in the region. Therefore, such reports prompted the idea to conduct this study to assess the river water suitability for irrigational commitments. Thus, Sirsa river water quality was assessed during the year 2018 by taking seven sampling sites as treatments which were replicated six times. To assess the suitability of Sirsa river water for irrigation purposes, various quality parameters such as pH, Electrical Conductivity (EC), Sodium Adsorption Ratio (SAR), Soluble Sodium Percentage (SSP), Residual Sodium Carbonate (RSC), Permeability Index (PI), Kelly’s Ratio (KR), Magnesium Hazard (Mg. Haz.)and Chloro-Alkaline Index (CAI) were determined. In the Sirsa river water pH, EC,RSC,SSP,SAR,PI,KR,Mg Hazand CAI were found in the range of 6.64-7.55, 129.50-719.67 µS/cm, -5.27 - -2.18 meq/l, 13.49-49.44%, 0.41-4.00%, 28.20-57.89%, 2.94-21.24%, 14.97-37.83%and 0.04-0.58%, respectively. All the factors were within the safe range for irrigation purposes except KR values. The high KR values above unity pointed out towards sodicity hazard of water which, therefore can not be used for irrigation purposes.
Highlights
Rivers are a much-valued feature of the natural ecosystem as these perform numerous vital functions
The water pH was within the prescribed standard limits of 6.5-8.5.26 significant variations were noticed in river water pH values which followed an increasing trend as river flows down from control site towards the last point along-side the industrial activities (Table 2).The addition of industrial and domestic effluents resulting in increased photosynthetic algal activities that consume all the dissolved carbon dioxide leading to decrease in the concentration of free CO2 thereby decreasing the acid formation which might have increased the water pH.[27,28]
The results are in line with Rana et al (2016)[29] who have describe driver water pH varying from 6.01-7.53 in Solan district in Himachal Pradesh (HP) while studying the various land
Summary
Rivers are a much-valued feature of the natural ecosystem as these perform numerous vital functions. Owing to its indiscriminate utilization due to the population explosion and various developmental activities, this vital resource is under tremendous pressure. The rapidly expanding industrialization and urbanization has exhausted the accessible water resources and the water quality has alsodegraded.[1,2] The factors like basin’s lithology, atmospheric and climatic conditions and anthropogenic activities have been reported to influence water quality.[3,4] Generally, industrial waste waters both non-treated or ill-treated often get mixed with house-hold sewage enter into the surface water bodies where they get dissolved or lie suspended in water deteriorating its quality and causing pollution.[5,6,7]
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