Ground-water provinces of India

George C. Taylor

doi:10.2113/gsecongeo.54.4.683

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Ground-water provinces of India

George C. Taylor

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Abstract

This paper gives a general resume of ground-water utilization and development and describes the occurrence of water in eight ground-water provinces of India. The paper is based in part on observations of the writer during 1951-55 and in part on earlier work of the Geological Survey of India. Ground water has been utilized extensively in India since before the beginning of the Christian era. Currently (1956) ground water is an important source of supply for domestic, stock, municipal, and industrial needs throughout the Republic and is widely used for irrigation in the Peninsular and Ganges-Brahmaputra regions west of longitude 85°. Dug, bored, and drilled wells are the principal means by which ground water is developed, although locally infiltration tunnels or improved springs are used. Methods of lifting or pumping water from wells include the hand line and bucket, the hand-lift pump, the counterpoised sweep, bullocks, and "mote," the water wheel, horizontal and vertical centrifugal pumps, and deep-well turbine pumps. The most common device for lifting water for irrigation is still the time-honored bullock and "mote" (leather bag). However, in modern India there is increasing use of mechanical pumps. With respect to the occurrence of ground water, India can be divided into eight provinces, lying in three major regions, (1) the Peninsular region, (2) the Ganges-Brahmaputra region, and (3) the Himalayan region. The Peninsular region contains six ground-water provinces. Precambrian igneous, metamorphic, and indurated sedimentary rocks and early Tertiary volcanic rocks in three of these provinces yield many small supplies of water, which generally is of good quality but locally is brackish or salty. Cretaceous water-bearing sandstones in another province are moderately productive and in places are developed for large water supplies. Late Tertiary and Quaternary water-bearing sands and gravels in two other provinces sustain many small water supplies and several large water supplies-particularly in the coastal areas of southern India. The Ganges-Brahmaputra region is a single ground-water province in which many tens of thousands of small water supplies and several thousand large supplies are obtained from water-bearing sands and gravels in late Tertiary and Quaternary alluvium. This province constitutes a vast groundwater reservoir, which is the most productive in India. The Himalayan region also is considered as a single province, in which ground water occurs in a series of narrow valleys filled with moderately to highly permeable Quaternary alluvium. These alluvial valleys transmit large quantities of water to the ground-water reservoir in the Ganges-Brahmaputra region.

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Source-reported bounding extent: 7.96553° to 35.49401° latitude; 68.17665° to 97.40256° longitude. This indicates report coverage, not an exact sampling location. View area on OpenStreetMap.

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George C. Taylor. 1959-06-01. Ground-water provinces of India. https://doi.org/10.2113/gsecongeo.54.4.683

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