Achieving Sustainable Development Goal for Clean Water in India: Influence of Natural and Anthropogenic Factors on Groundwater Microbial Pollution

Srimanti Duttagupta; Abhijit Mukherjee; Soumendra Nath Bhanja; Siddhartha Chattopadhyay; Soumyajit Sarkar; Kousik Das; Swagata Chakraborty; Debapriya Mondal

doi:10.1007/s00267-020-01358-6

Achieving Sustainable Development Goal for Clean Water in India: Influence of Natural and Anthropogenic Factors on Groundwater Microbial Pollution

Srimanti Duttagupta, Abhijit Mukherjee, Soumendra Nath Bhanja, Siddhartha Chattopadhyay, Soumyajit Sarkar, Kousik Das, Swagata Chakraborty, Debapriya Mondal

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14 Scopus citations

Abstract

Worldwide, >2 billion people (~1/3 world population), mostly living in economically stressed areas of Africa and South Asia, still do not have access to basic sanitation, and ~1 billion still practice open defecation. Water pollution due to open defecation may primarily be linked to economy, and other factors such as social and hygiene practices, land use and hydrogeological parameters could also have sufficient influence. The present study describes the effect of human development index (HDI, 2001–2015) and economic development (NL, 1992–2013) on groundwater microbial pollution (FC, 2002–2017) across India. Economic development pattern suggested discernable inverse relationship with FC in most areas, although areas with inferior water quality, improper human practices were found to outweigh economic development. Vulnerability modelling, using these data, along with measured FC in groundwater-sourced drinking water locations (n = 235) demonstrated the heterogeneity of FC distribution potential in areas of homogenous economy, social practices, and land use. High-resolution numerical modelling of the advective transport of the hypothetical FC particles in the aquifers, suggest up to ~24 times faster movement of pollutants under irrigation-induced pumping regimes. Hence, the results of our study highlight and quantify the potential pitfalls that are possible hindrance for achieving the United Nations sustainable development goal, despite social and economic development, across the spatial scales.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	742-755
Number of pages	14
Journal	Environmental Management
Volume	66
Issue number	5
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/s00267-020-01358-6
State	Published - Nov 1 2020
Externally published	Yes

Funding

We thank the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Government of India, for providing their data utilized in this study. We appreciate the Water Supply and Sanitation Organization, Public Health Engineering Department, Government of West Bengal for providing field support for the regional study in the Western Bengal basin. The work was partly supported by the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India (vide no. DST/TM/INDO-UK/2K17/55(C) & 55(G)) through NERC-DST Newton-Bhabha project (FAR-GANGA). This work is partially supported by Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), Department of Science and Technology (PDF/2017/000661, Dt. 31-07-2017). We express our gratitude to Vijay Lakshmi Valerian for technical help and support. We thank David Polya, University of Manchester, UK, for comments on the paper. We thank the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Government of India, for providing their data utilized in this study. We appreciate the Water Supply and Sanitation Organization, Public Health Engineering Department, Government of West Bengal for providing field support for the regional study in the Western Bengal basin. The work was partly supported by the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India (vide no. DST/TM/INDO-UK/2K17/55(C) & 55(G)) through NERC-DST Newton-Bhabha project (FAR-GANGA). This work is partially supported by Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), Department of Science and Technology (PDF/2017/000661, Dt. 31-07-2017). We express our gratitude to Vijay Lakshmi Valerian for technical help and support. We thank David Polya, University of Manchester, UK, for comments on the paper.

Funders	Funder number
Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation
NERC-DST Newton-Bhabha
Public Health Engineering Department, Government of West Bengal
Water Supply and Sanitation Organization
Western Bengal basin
Department of Science and Technology, Ministry of Science and Technology, India	DST/TM/INDO-UK/2K17/55
Science and Engineering Research Board	PDF/2017/000661, 31-07-2017
Department of Science and Technology, Government of Kerala

Keywords

Faecal coliform
Human development index
Night-time light
Population
Sustainable development goal
Western Bengal basin

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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10.1007/s00267-020-01358-6

Cite this

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title = "Achieving Sustainable Development Goal for Clean Water in India: Influence of Natural and Anthropogenic Factors on Groundwater Microbial Pollution",

abstract = "Worldwide, >2 billion people (~1/3 world population), mostly living in economically stressed areas of Africa and South Asia, still do not have access to basic sanitation, and ~1 billion still practice open defecation. Water pollution due to open defecation may primarily be linked to economy, and other factors such as social and hygiene practices, land use and hydrogeological parameters could also have sufficient influence. The present study describes the effect of human development index (HDI, 2001–2015) and economic development (NL, 1992–2013) on groundwater microbial pollution (FC, 2002–2017) across India. Economic development pattern suggested discernable inverse relationship with FC in most areas, although areas with inferior water quality, improper human practices were found to outweigh economic development. Vulnerability modelling, using these data, along with measured FC in groundwater-sourced drinking water locations (n = 235) demonstrated the heterogeneity of FC distribution potential in areas of homogenous economy, social practices, and land use. High-resolution numerical modelling of the advective transport of the hypothetical FC particles in the aquifers, suggest up to ~24 times faster movement of pollutants under irrigation-induced pumping regimes. Hence, the results of our study highlight and quantify the potential pitfalls that are possible hindrance for achieving the United Nations sustainable development goal, despite social and economic development, across the spatial scales.",

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AU - Bhanja, Soumendra Nath

AU - Chattopadhyay, Siddhartha

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Achieving Sustainable Development Goal for Clean Water in India: Influence of Natural and Anthropogenic Factors on Groundwater Microbial Pollution

Abstract

Funding

Keywords

UN SDGs

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