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NEW DELHI: A parliamentary panel on water resources has expressed concern over the rising level of groundwater contamination across the country, and recommended that the govt make all out efforts towards mitigation in the most affected regions by using latest technologies, including AI/Machine Learning and best global practices.The panel, which submitted its report this week, also took note of heavy metal contamination, including uranium, lead and nitrate, detected in Delhi’s groundwater, and the serious health risks which it may pose. It referred to instances of contamination flagged by the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) in its annual report in Nov last year.Though the panel appreciated corrective measures taken by the Jal Shakti ministry, it noted with concern the rising number of partially affected districts in terms of contamination of basic parameters like fluoride and nitrate in most states/UTs.
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The department of water resources, however, in its submission told the panel that groundwater contamination by heavy metals was “generally location-specific” and depended on local hydro-geological conditions and source pressures.“Therefore, exceedance at a monitoring location does not imply uniform contamination across the entire area,” it told the parliamentary standing committee on water resources headed by BJP Lok Sabha member Rajiv Pratap Rudy. When asked to provide a detailed note on groundwater contamination in India, its sources for contamination, and corrective measures taken in this regard, the department told the parliamentary committee that the groundwater monitoring is conducted by the respective state governments and the CGWB on a “regular basis”.“CGWB, at its level, conducts ground water quality monitoring through its network of around 17,000 monitoring stations spread throughout the country. The data so generated indicates that groundwater in India largely remains potable. However, occurrences of a few contaminants beyond permissible limits are reported in isolated pockets of some states and UTs. Reported contamination is both due to natural geogenic factors as well anthropogenic causes like rapid industrialisation, urbanisation, agricultural intensification etc.,” the department said in its response. The CGWB, in its report in Nov 2025, noted that groundwater quality across most parts of India, in general, was considered “good to excellent” but Rajasthan, Haryana and Andhra Pradesh faced “widespread contamination” and certain other states faced “localised contamination challenges”.The board’s report said arsenic contamination was a major concern in Ganga and Brahmaputra river basins while uranium contamination, although less widespread, was sporadically detected in parts of Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.It attributed contamination to discharge of untreated industrial waste, excessive use of fertilisers and pesticides, improper waste disposal and sewage leakage in urban areas and over-extraction of groundwater.The CGWB’s report highlighted that exceeding trace metal concentrations in groundwater was of critical concern as it directly affected both human health and environmental safety. “Toxic metals such as arsenic, lead and uranium can cause severe neurological, skeletal, kidney and cancer-related problems, while elevated iron and manganese levels pose risks, especially to infants and children,” it said. Go to Source
