Assessment of ground water quality of the Golaghat district of Assam, India and its peripheral area using multivariate statistical technique with special reference to the presence of higher levels of fluoride and arsenic

Abstract

The quality of ground and surface water sources is continuously deteriorating around the world day by day due to various anthropogenic activities. Some of the serious global groundwater quality issues drawing the attention of scientists from different countries of the world. Among them the mixing of either fluoride or arsenic in groundwater is very important. In India one of the highly fluoride and arsenic affected state is the Assam. The Golaghat district of Assam is sandwiched between two known fluoride and arsenic affected areas Jorhat district and Karbi-Anglong district of the state. Accordingly, in the present study it is focused to have a detailed survey of the ground water quality of this district and its peripheral areas with special reference to assessment of arsenic and fluoride level. It has been reaffirmed that six out of eight development blocks of Golaghat district are highly affected by arsenic and two development blocks are affected by fluoride. Besides arsenic and fluoride level, other water quality parameters were also measured and subjected to analyze the groundwater quality parameters by using statistical analytical tools. Statistical analysis showed that the both geogenic and anthropogenic sources are responsible for the groundwater quality variations of Golaghat district of Assam.