Ganga-Meghna Brahmaputra || West Bengal || Bangladesh || Middle Ganga Plain, Bihar || Uttarpradesh
Jharkhand || North-East Hilly States || Rajnandgaon, Chattisgarh || Behala, Kolkata, WB || As toxicity- Homeopathic Treatment
Effectiveness & Reliability - As Field Testing Kits || Utility Of Treatment Plant
Causes, Effects & Remedies - Groundwater As Calamity || References

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Groundwater Arsenic contamination in West Bengal-India (20 years study )

Reported work done by SOES

Groundwater arsenic contamination status of Murshidabad district, West Bengal-India. One of the worse arsenic affected areas in World scenario

Location and demography

 Murshidabad district lies between the latitudes of 23043/30// to 24050/20// N and longitudes of 87049/17// to 88044/ E. The river Ganga forms its northern and eastern boundaries and separates it from Bangladesh. The district comprises of 26 blocks, 262 GPs including Municipal areas (known as wards) and 1918 inhabited villages. Extending over an area of 5324 km2, the district has 58,66,569 inhabitants (30,05,000 are males and 28,61,569 females).
 

Arsenic contamination status in groundwater of Murshidabad district

To date, we have analyzed 29668 hand tubewell water samples from 1721 villages / wards in 250 GP’s/ Municipal area from all 26 blocks of the district (Table I). Figure I shows the groundwater arsenic situation in each block of Murshidabad with Pie-diagram distribution. We observed arsenic concentration above 10 µg/L in 15953 (53.8%) hand tubewells and in 7911 (26.7%) above 50 µg/L and 1337 (4.5%) of the tubewells had arsenic concentrations above 300µg/L. In Murshidabad the number of villagers where we found arsenic concentration above 10, 50 and 300 µg/L are 1320, 971 and 281 respectively; and 25, 24 and 17 blocks were found to be contaminated with arsenic levels above 10, 50 and 300 µg/L. Arsenic level above 1000µg/L was found in 71 tubewells; the maximum arsenic contamination level found in this district is 3003µg/L in the Nawda and Raghunathganj I blocks.

 

Groundwater arsenic situation and sufferings of people in Murshidabad district

Block
Total samples analysed 
Distribution of total samples in different arsenic concentration (mg/L) ranges
%of Samples with As >10mg/L
% of Samples with As >50mg/L
Max. conc. mg/L (samples with As >1000mg/L

≤3

4-10

11-50

51-100

101-200

201-300

300-500

501-1000

Beharampur

1821

797

180

560

180

79

15

7

3

46.3

15.6

635

Beldanga I

1396

459

86

368

194

126

52

64

45

61.1

34.7

1700 (2)

Beldanga II

1037

529

130

248

78

39

12

1

36.5

12.5

345

Bhagowangola I

1775

592

96

544

170

256

72

33

10

61.2

30.6

1285 (2)

Bhagowangola II

819

137

96

234

134

83

51

57

23

71.6

43.0

1852 (4)

Bharatpur I

616

533

47

34

2

-

-

-

-

5.8

0.3

82

Bharatpur II

625

625

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

0

<3

Burwan

702

684

10

6

2

-

-

-

-

1.1

0.3

64

Domkal

3371

729

295

1166

429

392

161

139

58

69.6

35.0

1300 (2)

Farrakka

489

84

33

285

81

6

-

-

-

76.1

17.8

150

Hariharpara

1520

436

123

453

182

117

88

93

27

63.2

33.4

1160 (1)

Jalangi

1917

317

109

516

288

233

129

178

109

77.8

50.9

2040 (38)

Jiaganj

1235

492

205

360

123

49

6

-

-

43.6

14.4

286

Kandi

932

832

64

28

7

1

-

-

-

3.9

0.9

140

Khargram

715

670

22

20

3

-

-

-

-

3.2

0.4

75

Lalgola

1030

180

98

397

174

138

16

14

12

73.0

34.5

1028 (1)

Nabagram

705

656

41

8

-

-

-

-

-

1.1

0

40

Nawda

1208

420

17

516

141

63

18

20

12

63.8

21.1

3003 (1)

Raghunathganj I

515

394

21

34

36

9

9

6

1

19.4

12.8

3003 (5)

Raghunathganj II

1233

266

40

371

355

146

26

23

6

75.2

45.1

875

Raninagar I

778

132

116

253

122

123

24

6

1

68.1

35.6

1018 (1)

Raninagar II

2219

489

261

610

189

253

165

191

54

66.2

38.7

1652 (7)

Sagardighi

707

637

28

25

15

1

-

-

1

5.9

2.4

560

Samsherganj

878

120

69

480

111

77

21

-

-

78.5

23.8

287

Suti I

443

130

9

85

104

67

30

17

1

68.6

49.4

700

Suti II

982

131

48

441

147

108

46

35

19

81.8

36.9

1852 (7)

Total

29668

11471

2244

8042

3267

2366

941

884

382

53.8

26.7

3003 (71)

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