The groundwater in most parts of 11 districts in Haryana is not suitable for drinking.
“The groundwater in the southern and western parts comprising Sirsa, Fatehabad, Hisar, Bhiwani, Mewat, Mahendragarh, Rewari and Faridabad districts is mostly saline and not suitable for drinking purposes. Three more districts of Jind, Rohtak and Jhajjar also have low potable rating,” according to the 2019-20 report of Central Ground Water Board (CGWB).
Besides high salinity, the water samples in these districts have high fluoride or nitrate or combination of all, the report said.
Salinity, chloride, fluoride and nitrate are important parameters that are normally considered for evaluating the suitability of groundwater for drinking purposes.
The report stated that more than 50 percent samples from the districts of Bhiwani, Fatehabad, Hisar, Jhajjar, Jind, Mahendragarh, Mewat, Rewari, Rohtak and Sirsa reported low potable rating as chemical parameters were found to be higher than permissible limits.
For irrigation purposes, the CGWB report said that based on Residual Sodium Carbonate (RSC) values of groundwater, it was found that 68.23 percent of the waters are safe, 10.07 percent marginal and the remaining 21.70 percent are unfit for irrigational use in the state.
The CGWB observed that the groundwater mostly from the southern, western and southwestern parts comprising of Bhiwani, Faridabad, Fatehabad, Hisar, Jhajjar, Mahendragarh, Mewat, Palwal, Rewari, Sirsa districts falls under the category, used continuously for irrigation and this is likely to cause salinity hazards and lead to reduction in crop yields.
This may also cause sodium hazards and lead to hardening of soils when used for irrigation without the addition of adequate quantity of gypsum, it stated
The alkali hazards of irrigation groundwater are estimated through the computation of RSC and waters with RSC value <1.25 meq/L are safe for irrigational uses, RSC between 1.25 and 2.5 are marginal and waters with RSC value >2.5 meq/L are unsafe.
The RSC of groundwater was found to vary from below zero (-82.21) to 23.60 meq/L at Israna in district Panipat, as per the report.
Notably, in most of rural and semi-urban areas of Haryana, groundwater is a major resource for drinking, irrigation and industrial applications especially in areas where surface water is inadequate or unavailable.
Among other parameters, magnesium was found to be less than the desirable limit of 30 mg/L in 36 percent samples and less than the maximum permissible limit of 100 mg/L for drinking waters (as per Bureau of Indian Standards) in 76 percent samples.
In Haryana, sodium is the dominant cation in majority of groundwater except for the districts namely Ambala, Karnal, Kurukshetra, Panchkula, Yamunanagar and its concentration varied widely from 1 mg/L at Dabwali district in Sirsa to 1802 mg/L at Kapro in district Hisar. Sodium concentration was found to be less than 100 mg/L in more than half of well waters under consideration, the report pointed out.
Apart from this, high concentration of potassium (>100mg/L) was found in 8.95 percent samples and it indicated contamination of groundwater from various point (industry, sewage) as well as non-point sources (agriculture). Overall, it ranged from <1 mg/L at various locations to 1875 mg/L at Samargopalpur in district Rohtak.
Calcium was also found to be very low in some districts, though it is very essential element for drinking and irrigation purposes.
According to the CGWB report, at few places where EC (salinity) of groundwater goes beyond 5000 µS/cm and sodium adsorption ratio (SAR) is more than 10, such waters are not suitable for customary irrigation. The CGWB recommended that areas identified with unsuitable or marginally suitable water quality should be monitored on micro level to effectively delineate such areas and use suitable management measures.
During the survey, 447 ground water samples were collected uniformly from 22 districts of Haryana for chemical analysis.
Salinity in groundwater
The ground water occurring in the southern and western parts comprising eight districts is mostly saline and not suitable for drinking purposes. Salinity of groundwater is measured in terms of EC. The groundwater was found to have low to very high salt content as the EC of well water ranged from 192 ?S/cm at Manesar in district Gurugram to 13960 ?S/cm at Machana in Gurugram. It was found that 29.08 percent samples had EC less than 750 µS/cm, 47.87 percent had between 750 and 3000 µS/cm and the remaining 23.05 percent of the samples had EC above 3000µS/cm.
Distribution of Chloride (Cl) content
Chloride content ranged from 7.3 mg/L to 4126 mg/L in the entire state. Chloride concentration above 400 mg/L gives a salty taste to water and based on these aesthetic considerations, Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has recommended a desirable limit of 250 mg/L for chloride in drinking water. This limit can be extended to 1000 mg/L in case of absence of a source with desirable concentration. The report said that chloride was less than 250 mg/L in 62.19 percent samples, between 250 and 1000 mg/L in 27.29 percent samples and only 10.52 percent samples were found to have chloride above 1000 mg/L. Cl was more than 1000 mg/L in isolated places in Sirsa, Hisar, Bhiwani, Rewari, Mahendragarh, Mewat, Jhajjar and Rohtak districts.
Distribution of Nitrate (NO3)
In Haryana, nitrate in water samples varied from <0.20 to 577 mg/L. BIS permits a maximum concentration of 45 mg/L nitrate in drinking water. It was found that 85.23 percent samples, spread over the entire state, had nitrate below 45 and 14.77 percent had more than 45 mg/L. Quite a significant number of water samples from Hisar, Sirsa, Fatehabad and Bhiwani was found to have nitrate above 45 mg/L. Occurrence of nitrate in ground water above 5.0 mg/L reflects contamination at some stage of its percolation and circulation. The probable sources of nitrate contamination of groundwater are through excessive application of fertilizers, bacterial nitrification of organic nitrogen, and seepage from animal and human wastes and atmospheric inputs.
Distribution of Fluoride (F)
Groundwater with fluoride above 1.50 mg/L were found mainly in Jind, Sirsa, Fatehabad, Hisar, Bhiwani, Panipat, Sonipat and Sonipat districts. Fluoride in small amounts in drinking water is beneficial while in large amounts it is injurious. The fluoride content in groundwater ranged from <0.05 to 12 mg/L in the state. BIS recommends that fluoride concentration up to 1.00 mg/L in drinking water is desirable, up to 1.50 mg/L is permitted and above 1.50 mg/L is injurious. It was found that 78.97 percent samples had fluoride in desirable range, 5.82 percent in the permissible and the remaining 15.21 percent had fluoride above 1.50 mg/L. Extensive use of phosphatic fertilizers, which have fluoride as impurity can be the potential source of fluoride concentration.