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A GIS-based DRASTIC model for assessing groundwater vulnerability in hard rock granitic aquifer

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Abstract

The groundwater vulnerability has become a major problem in most of the countries which are growing at a faster pace. The DRASTIC model is the most widely adopted method to assess the groundwater vulnerability to contamination in most studies and has also been implemented in the present study which has been conducted in a small watershed of Palamu, Jharkhand, India. The study showed that the DRASTIC index lies in the range of 79 to 160 which were classified into four zones, viz., low-, moderate-, high-, and very high-risk zone of groundwater contamination. The groundwater vulnerability map showed that about 31 and 24 % of the study area lie between high risk to very high risk of groundwater pollution and 16 and 28 % of the study area are occupied by moderate risk to low risk of pollution zone, respectively. The use of Geographic Information System (GIS) facilitated the preparation of the thematic layers to be overlaid in the GIS environment to obtain the risk zones spatially.

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Acknowledgments

Authors are thankful to the Central Ground Water Board for providing the weathered zone thickness data and to the Indian Meteorological Department for providing the rainfall data for the study area. Authors (SS and AST) acknowledge the financial assistance under the UGC Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Remote Sensing, Birla Institute of Technology Mesra, Ranchi, 835215, Jharkhand, India

    Shashank Shekhar, A. C. Pandey & Anamika Shalini Tirkey

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  1. Shashank Shekhar
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  2. A. C. Pandey
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  3. Anamika Shalini Tirkey
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Correspondence to A. C. Pandey.

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Shekhar, S., Pandey, A.C. & Tirkey, A.S. A GIS-based DRASTIC model for assessing groundwater vulnerability in hard rock granitic aquifer. Arab J Geosci 8, 1385–1401 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-014-1285-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-014-1285-2

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