Groundwater Quality in Holy Tourist Place Puskar, Rajasthan, India

I. Hussian¹, J. Hussain²*, M. Arif³** and M.C. Joshi⁴***

¹Public Health Engineering Department (PHED), Bhilwara-311 001 (India) ²Department of Chemistry, Alok Post Graduate Science College, Kekri, Ajmer- 305 404 (India) ³Department of Environmental Studies, M.D.S. University, Ajmer-305 009 (India) ⁴BITS, Pilani; Yashdeep"" A-14, Mandhusudan Colony, Naka Madar, Ajmer (India)"

A physicochemical and bacteriological study of 20 hand pumps of holy town Puskar was carried out. The results were compared with IS: 10500, 1993 standards for its potability. 6 samples were found to have all analyzed physico-chemical parameter within maximum desirable limit and 14 samples were found bacteriologically potable. The hand pumps of the study area near to Puskar Sarover have better quality while the hand pumps that are far from sarovar and situated in dense population area have higher sodium concentration with the contamination of nitrate. Correlations for all possible pair of physico chemical parameters were calculated. Electrical conductance and calcium show maximum correlation coefficient (>9.0) with total dissolved solids, total alkalinity, total hardness, chloride and sulfate. The linear regression was developed for these pairs of parameter due to its importance for rapid monitoring of ground water quality. For geo-chemical characteristics of ground water Piper trilinear diagram was plotted. From Piper diagram it is clear that the ground water has sodium, chloride and sulfate as dominant ions. The ground water of Puskar town falls in Na-K-Cl-SO4 hydro chemical facies. From bacteriological examination for total coliforms it is concluded that 50% samples are excellent while only 5% samples are unsatisfactory. Therefore, 9 samples (45%) are satisfactory to suspicious. 'The E.coli examination of 10 samples indicated presence of E.coli in 6 samples (4 are suspicious and 2 are unsatisfactory).

Ground water; Geochemical; Bacteriological study