Affiliations: [a] School of Vocational Studies and Applied Sciences, Gautam Buddha University, Greater Noida. Uttar Pradesh, India
| [b] Department of Environmental Sciences, Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar (Central) University, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India
| [c] Centre of Environmental Studies, University of Allahabad, Prayagraj – 211002, India
| [d] Department of Botany, Government Boys Degree College, Udhampur, Jammu & Kashmir, India
| [e] Department of Environmental Science, Central University of Jharkhand, Ranchi, Jharkhand, India
| [f] Department of Community Medicine and School of Public Health, PGIMER, Chandigarh, India
Abstract: Our knowledge of the water quality of small mountainous water streams (rivulets) is based on very limited data; therefore, the current study has been carried out to assess the impact of human activities on the water quality of ‘Devika’ stream, a rivulet flowing through Udhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir by following physico-chemical parameters, such as temperature, pH, EC, hardness, major anions and major cations. The Piper diagram showed that 30% of water samples belonged to the Ca2+ type, whereas 70% of the remaining samples were in no dominant cation facies. Similarly, for anions, 50% of samples were categorised into Cl- type, 30% in no dominant type, 20% HCO3- type, therefore, facies classification indicated that maximum samples were CaCl2 type. The indices Na%, sodium adsorption ratio (SAR), permeability index (PI), magnesium hazard (MH) and residual sodium carbonate (RSC) were applied to check the appropriateness of water for the irrigation purpose and their average value was found to be 24.19, 0.75, 47, 48.06, and 1.12 meq/L, respectively. These values revealed that despite various human activities, all the water samples were found suitable for irrigation purposes.
Keywords: Hydro-geochemistry, irrigational suitability, streams, water quality
