TRACE METAL ACCUMULATION, BEHAVIOUR AND POTENTIAL TOXICITY IN CENTRAL GANGETIC BASINPRABHAT RANJAN, MANISH PANDEY, SUNITI PARASHAR AND AJIT KUMAR VIDYARTHIAbstract The River Ganga referred to as the Ganges has been one of the major receivers of sewage and industrial effluents in India. The present work collects data from the present published literature on surface water and surface sediment chemistry data across Central Gangetic basin from the published literature. And, the published surface water and surface sediment chemistry data have been used to compute different pollution indices i.e. Contamination Factor (CF); Pollution load index (PLI); Enrichment Factor (EF); Geo-accumulation index (I-geo); Potential ecological risk index (Eif); and Potential toxicity response index (RI), for better appraisement of the status of pollution in the Ganga River Basin. Trace metals like Al, As, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Pb and Zn; contamination in water as well as soil contamination was evaluated on the basis of the geoaccumulation index, enrichment factor (EF), contamination factor and toxicity index. Data collected from the published literature reveals high concentration of trace metal like Cd, Cr, Fe, Ni, Pb and Zn found in several studies at Mirzapur, Varanasi, Narora, Kanpur and Allahabad. High contamination and enrichment of Cd also became evident on the basis of observations made at Kanpur and Allahabad whereas Fe, Mn and Zn were found heavily accumulated at most of sites. Indiscriminate disposal of domestic and hazardous industrial waste in the study area could be the main cause of soil contamination, spreading by rainwater and wind. |