Bacteriological water quality status of River Yamuna in Delhi

 

Chetna Anand¹, Pratima Akolkar¹ and Rina Chakrabarti²

¹Central Pollution Control Board, Delhi-110 032, India ² Department of Zoology, Delhi University, Delhi-110 007, India

 

(Received: 16 April, 2004 ; Accepted: 31 August, 2004)

 

Abstract: Bacteriological water quality status in terms of total coliform and faecal coliform count was studied on both? - east and west banks of river Yamuna in Delhi. Membrane filtration technique was adopted for enumeration of total coliform and faecal coliform count in the river water sample collected on monthly basis for 2 years ? 2002 and 2003. The study reveals the impact of diverse anthropogenic activities as well as the monsoon effect on the bacterial population of river Yamuna in Delhi stretch. Microbial population contributed mainly through human activities prevailed in the entire stretch of Yamuna river with reduction in bacterial counts during monsoon period due to flushing effect. Bacteriological assessment does not provide an integrated effect of pollution but only indicate the water quality at the time of sampling. Hence, this parameter is time and space specific.

 

Key words: Bacteriological water quality, Total coliform, Faecal coliform, Membrane filtration technique.

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