Water Quality Indices Criteria for Quality Assessment of Water Resources

Water is natural resources to basic human need and a precious national asset. India accounts for 2.2 % of the global land and 4 % of the world water resources but must support more than 16 % of the world population. Water forms one of the primary resources for the development activities. In recent year there has been a tremendous demand of the fresh water and India is facing an acute shortage of water during the summer in most part of the country. In societies with the developing economies like India, the optimum development and efficient management of their water resources should be dominant strategy for economic growth. Although in the recent years unscientific planning and management and use of this resource for various purposes almost invariably has created undesirable problem in its wake water logging and salinity in case agricultural use and environmental pollution of as result of industrial and municipal use. Water quality index is useful and unique rating that depicts the composite influence of different water quality parameter and communicates water quality information to the public and legislative decision makers. It is necessary to predict the overall water quality status in a single term that is helpful for the selection of appropriate treatment techniques to meet the concern issues. It describes the water quality on the basis of the selection of water parameter involve in the usability of the water for particular purposes. Although, there is no globally accepted, composite index of water, quality some countries and regions have used/are using, aggregated water quality data in the development of water quality indices. The present paper reviews the water quality index criteria for the suitably of the drinking water sources and provide the mechanisms in use for presenting a cumulatively derived, numerical expression defining a certain level of water quality.