Impact of Anthropogenic and Industrial Activities on Water Quality and Water-Self-Purification Capacity of Subarnarekha River, Jharkhand

摘要

Laboratory study is conducted to obtain the magnitude of heavy metals, organic contamination and self-purification capacity of Subarnarekha River. Water samples were collected from eight sites along the course of the river in summer, monsoon and winter seasons. Most of the water samples were found beyond limit of Indian drinking water standard (IS. 10500). The data generated were further used to compute the metal pollution index (MPI) and organic pollution index (OPI) of river water. The mean MPI andOPI ranged from 38 to 334 and 3.76 to 15.51, respectively at different sites of river and these values are far beyond the critical index limit of 100 for MPI and ￡: 2 for OPI. The mean value of MPI at site S, was well below the critical index limit of100. These results revealed that river water is highly contaminated and need proper treatment of effluents prior to discharge in the river. The patterns of variation of mean MPI and OPI at all sites are in the order: summer > monsoon > winter. This kindof pattern indicated accumulation of metal and organic contaminants during slow and sluggish How period of river. The low values in monsoon and winter may be due to dilution effects. The water self-purification capacityof BOD and NH.-N varied in the order : Muri > Ghatshila > Jamshedpur.