Assessment of pollution load on river Ganga from Haridwar to Garhmukteshwar

Research Paper (undergraduate) from the year 2014 in the subject Environmental Sciences, grade: 8.5, , course: M.Tech, language: English, abstract: There were many schemes for pollution abatement of River Ganga. Ganga Action Plan (1 and 2) and thereafter NRCD and National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGBRA) launched by Government of India. But these plans focused only on big cities and did not take into account pollution generated in the entire stretch/catchment. In their efforts small cities, semi urban settlements, Industries and pollution from rural sector were not addressed. As a result program had limited success and the improvement in water quality of River Ganga was limited. The impact of human activity or a project on an environmental resource or eco-system may be considered insignificant when assessed in isolation, but may become significant when evaluated. This study aims at studying the assessment of assessment of pollution load on point source discharges in river Ganga catchment from Haridwar to Garhmukteshwar (160 km) based on field visits , satellite data supported with details from Survey of India topographical sheets, census data, district Industry data, water quality and discharge data. In study area seven point sources were identified based on the criteria of either existence of class I or class II city/town in the catchment of drain or falling of industrial effluent in drains.