Assessment of Ground Water Quality of Greater Guwahati With Reference To Iron and Fluoride

Abstract

Safe drinking water has become an emotive issue in Assam, primarily with fluoride, arsenic and iron contamination. Unfortunately, fluoride contamination is a very recent issue that has been observed in various districts of Assam. This study intends to assess the ground water scenario of greater Guwahati and identify the iron and fluoride affected areas. Eight different locations have been selected within the city and the sources were mainly boring deep tube wells, ring wells and tube well. The investigation reveals that iron and fluoride are the points of concern in the areas considered for the study. The concentration of iron was found to be high in almost all the locations, maximum being 8.59mg/l, reflecting the water quality to be unsafe for drinking directly from the source. Moreover, in case of fluoride, out of eight monitoring sites, two locations namely 'Satgaon' and 'Hatigaon' were observed to be crossing the permissible limits of 1.5mg/l, with 2mg/l and 1.6mg/l respectively. The other water quality parameters like pH, conductivity, alkalinity, chloride, total hardness, calcium, magnesium and nitrate were found to be within the permissible limit.