Brij Gopal

• PhD
• Managing Director at Centre for inland waters in South Asia

Iy us a Policy Brief

Research contribution by late Ramesh D Gulati

Wetlands in India have been classified using several different approaches which recognise a number of types whereas a hierarchical phylogenetic classification based on detailed inventory of wetlands and their characteristics has yet to be elaborated. © Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature 2018. All rights reserved.

It is fact sheet on Karst Wetland of Kotumsar Cave.

The Ramsar Convention has gradually expanded the scope of the term ‘wetland’ to bring under its umbrella all kinds of inland freshwater (and saline) ecosystems as well as many marine ecosystems. It is not possible to develop a common framework for the study, management or policy of such a large and divergent assemblage of habitats with water being...

Traditional tanks, village ponds, and farm ponds are time saving, cost-effective, environmentally benign, and viable solutions to ensuring water and food security in drought-prone regions such as Bundelkhand. Expensive mega projects with large reservoirs such as the Ken–Betwa link take decades to plan, design, and implement, and cause enormous envi...

In recent decades, environmental flows has emerged a major instrument for sustaining and/or rehabilitating the ecosystem functions and services of rivers worldwide. The holistic methodologies of assessment of environmental flows (=EFlows) take into account the physical, biological, water quality and socio-cultural as well as livelihood aspects of r...

Assessment of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services for Conserving Wetlands

We introduce here the term “River Culture” to delineate an eco-social approach to mitigate the biological and cultural diversity crisis in riverscapes. It is based on the insight that current environmental change endangers both, biological and cultural diversities in rivers and their basins, and those activities to improve ecosystem functions, biod...

Sundarban mangroves, world?s largest contiguous forested wetland system (estimated at about 10,000 sq km), lie in the deltas of Ganga-Brahmaputra-Meghna rivers. Rivers Hooghly and Baleshwar form its western and eastern boundaries respectively whereas the river Harinbhanga (= Ichamati or Raimongal) demarcates the border between India and Bangladesh....

The arid zone of western India hosts many natural wetlands which include the salt lakes such as Lake Sambhar- a Ramsar site in Rajasthan, and intertidal mud flats, saline marshes, and Avicennia-dominated mangroves in Gujarat. These wetlands have a relatively low but highly characteristic biodiversity that includes endemic and threatened species suc...

Wetlands in India have been classified using several different approaches which recognise a number of types whereas a hierarchical phylogenetic classification based on detailed inventory of wetlands and their characteristics has yet to be elaborated.

A talk on how cultures depend on water and how cultural changes are impacting water.

presents views what should be treated as wetland and what not.

Historically wetlands were integrated into the socio-cultural ethos of the people of South and Southwest Asia. However, during the past century wetlands have been lost and degraded primarily because they were labelled as wastelands and did not receive attention in the development plans. Wetlands are treated as dustbins for wastewaters and solid was...

Sundarban, the single largest contiguous area of mangroves in the delta of Ganga, Brahmaputra and Meghna, is shared between India and Bangladesh. The landscape consists of a network of tidal creeks, waterways, marshes and pools, low and high mangroves, strands of grasses and islands which disappear and reappear twice a day with the tides. Like othe...

Executive summary During the course of this century the resilience of many ecosystems (their ability to adapt naturally) is likely to be exceeded by an unprecedented combination of change in climate, associated disturbances (e.g., flooding, drought, wildfire, insects, ocean acidification) and in other global change drivers (especially land-use ch...

Tropical and subtropical Asia differs from other tropical regions in its monsoonal climate and the dominant influence of the Hindukush and Himalayan mountain ranges which result in extremes of spatial and temporal variability in precipitation. However, several major rivers and their tributaries arise in the Himalayan ranges and are fed by thousands...

Wetlands cover at least 6 % of the Earth’s surface. They play a key role in hydrological and biogeochemical cycles, harbour a large part of the world’s biodiversity, and provide multiple services to humankind. However, pressure in the form of land reclamation, intense resource exploitation, changes in hydrology, and pollution threaten wetlands on a...

No abstract

This book addresses some critical issues related to aquatic ecosystems and integrated water resource management.

Riverine fisheries are of particular importance in the tropical regions as they provide food and nutrition to millions of people and support their livelihood. However, ever-increasing, multiple demands of water for irrigated agriculture, domestic and industrial supplies and hydropower generation have greatly impacted upon the river flows and riveri...

River Yamuna, the largest tributary of River Ganga, has been extensively regulated by construction of several barrages and embankments. A barrage, constructed in 1872 at Tajewala (now a few km upstream at Hathnikund) diverts almost all of its water for irrigation, except during the rainy season. The vast floodplain of the river downstream have been...

INTRODUCTION The Earth's organisms have depended on water since they arose 3.5 billion years ago. In the last 10 000 years, human development of stone tools, learning of food cultivation, growth of civilizations and trade, and migration among others have increasingly impinged on aquatic ecosystems. During the last century, the human population has...

INTRODUCTION Wetlands are highly diverse and complex ecosystems that include a wide spectrum of aquatic habitats, depending upon the definition adopted for different objectives (Mitsch & Gosselink 2000). They occur in all climatic zones throughout the world (e.g. Chapters 7, 9 and 11). Despite the many functions and values that are now widely recog...

Along with a growing interest in India in constructed wetlands for the treatment of both domestic and industrial wastewaters, there is also increasing realization of the need for tertiary treatment of effluents from conventional treatment plants before their discharge into surface waters. In this context, three wetland plant species (Phragmites kar...

The River Yamuna is the second most important river after River Ganga and has attracted much attention because three major cities -Delhi (the capital of India), Agra (the city known for Taj Mahal) and Mathura (the birthplace of Lord Krishna) -are located within a stretch of 200 km on its banks. This stretch is the most polluted and degraded in the...

Scirpus littoralis is a wetland plant commonly found in Yamuna flood plains of Delhi, India. The ability of Scirpus littoralis to take up and translocate five metals- Mn, Ni, Cu, Zn and Pb from fly ash dosed and metal spiked soils were studied under waterlogged and field conditions for 90 days. Scirpus littoralis accumulated Mn, Ni, Cu, Zn and Pb u...

Ecology is a well-established biocentric interdisciplinary science that deals with the complex interrelation-ships between all kinds of organisms (microbes to humans) and their dynamic interactions with the physical environment at various scales of time and space. Ecology forms the 'heart' and 'backbone' of the Environ-mental Science which emerged...

The paper describes the basic characteristics of natural floating islands, and discusses the ecological and socio-economic functions, values, and disadvantages of both natural and artificial floating islands. A survey is supplied of the floating islands in India, followed by analysis of the factors that pertain to management decisions regarding the...

Agriculture, which laid the foundation of human civilisation, has been closely linked with wetlands since its very beginning in riparian habitats. Around the world, agriculture has increasingly been expanded at the expense of wetlands and large areas of wetlands, which have been converted into paddy fields or drained for agriculture. Today, intensi...

Contrary to the general impression, and paradoxical as it may appear, arid and semiarid regions are often quite rich in water resources and have many aquatic habitats. Some of the world’s large rivers such as Nile, Indus and Murray—Darling, pass through the arid regions though their source of water lies far outside the arid zone (Williams 2000). Ma...

River Ganga is the largest and most sacred river of India. As compared to the mighty Amazon, it is very small but exerts great influence on the socio-cultural life and economy of India. Though the basin of River Ganga has been the cradle of human civilisation for several millennia. the rapid growth of human population, coupled with urbanisation, in...

Preface (B. Gopal, W.J. Junk, J.A. Davis) Biodiversity in wetlands: an introduction. B. Gopal, W.J.Junk The importance of stream-wetland-systems for biodiversity. K.M. Wantzen, W.J. Junk Riverine wetlands and biodiversity conservation in tropical Asia. D. Dudgeon Fish biodiversity in floodplains and their associated rivers. R.L. Welcomme Biodiversi...

Vol. 2 Preface Biodiversity of the French river Rhône and its floodplain: current state, historical changes and restoration potential Jean-François Fruget and Jean-Louis Michelot Biodiversity changes in the lower Danube river system A. Vadineanu, S. Cristofor and V. Iordache Plant diversity of fen landscapes in the Netherlands Jos T.A. Verhoeven an...

Realization of the rapid loss of species due to habitat destruction has brought into focus the multiple dimensions of biodiversity and led to the Convention on Biological Diversity. The biodiversity of inland aquatic ecosystems has just started receiving some attention. Wetlands whose conservation and wise use has been promoted by the Ramsar Conven...

Wetlands are being considered increasingly important for wastewater treatment because of the ability of many wetland plants to absorb large amounts of nutrient and a variety of toxic substances. The paper highlights the physical, chemical and biological processes which contribute to the improvement of water quality, and the distinction between natu...

Total uptake of nitrogen, phosphorus, calcium, magnesium, sodium and potassium by a natural stand of Arundo donax L. growing in the marginal upland area of a sewage drain near Jaipur city (India) was estimated by following seasonal changes in nutrient concentrations in the live and dead parts of the above- and belowground organs. Tissue concentrati...

Phragmites karka (=P. vallatoria) and Arundo donax are common wetland species which form large dense stands and often occur together in Indian wetlands. Natural stands of both the species and one stand of A. donax raised in the University Campus at Jaipur (Rajasthan) were investigated for their stand structure and total standing crops. Annual net p...

The worldwide attention on biodiversity in its varied dimensions following the adoption of the Convention on Biological Diversity, is largely focussed on the terrestrial environments, a few economically important species, and to some extent on the marine environment. The biodiversity in the inland aquatic environments receives little attention desp...

This volume contains seven papers giving reviews of limnology in Ghana, Tunisia, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Papua New Guinea, Malaysia and Pakistan. The particular emphasis of the papers is on limnological research and training, and authors were encouraged to cover pure and applied limnology in their country. Great variability has emerged in the treatm...

Contains selected papers from a conference on wetlands and ecotones held in New Delhi, December 1991. A discussion of the distinction between wetlands and ecotones is followed by a detailed account of the characteristics of lake littoral and riparian ecotones in temperate regions for comparison with tropical situations. The interactions at the sedi...

The River Yamuna, originating in the Himalayas, is the largest tributary of the River Ganga (Ganges) into which it flows at Allahabad. Its drainage basin covers about 42% of the Ganga River basin and about 11% of India's total land area. The area of the Yamuna drainage basin is densely populated and under intensive agriculture, while industrial act...

The paper reviews the available information on the distribution, vegetation, associated fauna, important ecological characteristics, use, management, and conservation status of wetlands in South Asia. The region, better identified as the Indian subcontinent, is a natural biogeographic region isolated from the remaining Asian landmass by nearly cont...

Chlorophyll content and phytoplanktonic primary production were studied in a non-polluted and a polluted reservoir near Jaipur. The polluted reservoir (Mansagar) has been receiving the untreated sewage of Jaipur city. It has also been infested with water hyacinth since 1979. -from Authors

Water hyacinth Eichhornia crassipes, salvinia Salvinia molesta and alligator weed Alternanthera philoxeroides are among the most spectacular examples of species which have caused serious problems throughout the tropics and have been most investigated. Among others, noteworthy are several submerged species of the family Hydrocharitaceae, the shrubby...

Standing crops in the natural stands varied from 3629-6684 g m⁻², and from 6407-16 709 g m⁻² in the Campus stand. The rhizome was deep seated in two natural populations but shallow (40 cm deep) in the other two, including Campus stand. Leaf area indices in the natural and Campus stands were 5.6-10.03 and 12.6-29.7 respectively. Maximum leaf area an...

An account of the aquatic vegetation should first set its limits by defining an aquatic plant. Unfortunately there is as yet no universally agreed definition; and it is indeed impossible to define it in universal terms. The boundary between land and water presents a spectrum of habitats ever changing in time and space, with a gradient of water regi...

The aquatic plants, as discussed in the previous chapter, tend to reproduce vigorously by vegetative means and rapidly develop pure single species populations over large areas. However, it is not uncommon to find a number of species of related as well as different growth forms to occur together in different communities that can be readily distingui...

The Indian subcontinent offers a large diversity of aquatic habitats differing in size, hydrological regimes, sediment characteristics, nutrient status and human impacts in all kinds of climatic zones ranging from humid tropical to hot arid and montane temperate. Large spatial and temporal variability in rainfall brought by monsoons results in larg...

Primary production, i.e. the production of organic matter by the plants, holds the key to energy dynamics of all ecosystems as the plants alone can transform the radiant energy into chemical energy which is then used and further transformed by other organisms. For long man has been interested in the processes, and their rates, related to the produc...

Plants, besides their key importance in energy flow, also play a major role in the circulation of the chemical elements. Primary production, i.e. conversion of radiant energy into chemical energy in photosynthesis, necessarily involves a large number of chemical elements. Primary production, i.e. conversion of radiant energy into chemical elements....

Populations are basic functional units of an ecosystem and therefore, a knowledge of their ecological equipment is essential to the understanding of both the ecosystem and the role of these populations in it. Ecology of a population is concerned with the distribution and abundance of the particular species and its temporal changes in relation to re...

The Indian subcontinent, the most populous region of the earth, is quite unique in its geological history, geomorphology, climate, biota, and also the cultures and human history. The economy of the region is based chiefly on agriculture but during the past few decades, industrialisation has also made rapid progress. All these factors have a profoun...

Life originated and evolved in water. Later the The tropical countries where the need to under­ plants moved out of water, conquered the land and stand the natural ecosystems is far greater because became dominant over it. The evolution through they are under intensive pressure from develop­ the millennia resulted in enormous complexity of ment fro...

Eichhornia crassipes, a native of South America, has been introduced into many parts of the tropical and subtropical world where it has become a serious aquatic weed. Section I of this monograph describes the systematics and geography of the Pontederiaceae, and includes discussion of phenology and reproduction. Ecology and environmental impact are...

This book provides a bibliography of over 2700 references and a critical review of the current knowledge on all aspects of the plant. Important data on all these aspects have been compiled and presented in numerous tables and figures making the book the most important reference work to date on waterhyacinth. Areas requiring the extra attention of r...

The tissue concentrations of calcium, magnesium, nitrogen and phosphorus in the leaves (aboveground shoots) and vertical branches of rhizomes of Typha elephantina Roxb. were studied near Jaipur (India) during 1975–1976. The calcium and magnesium concentrations did not show clear trends of seasonal change. Nitrogen exhibited two peak levels in the l...

Professor Ramdeo Misra Receives Sanjay Gandhi Award for Ecology - Volume 11 Issue 3 - Brij Gopal

Water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes (Mart.) Solms.) invaded a eutrophic reservoir receiving domestic sewage near Jaipur (India) during 1975 and gradually developed a complete thick cover over the whole water body during Sept.–Oct. 1978. The physico-chemical characteristics of the water and the phytoplankton composition were studied during Sept. 19...

The seeds of Typha angustata Bory et Chaub. germinate at room temperature (25–27°C) only in the presence of light. Percentage germination increases with an increase in both light intensity and duration. 100% germination occurs within 48 h at 1000 lux and 18 h photoperiod. Germination is inhibited by blue light, but this can be reversed by exposure...

Ceratophyllum demersum L. and C. muricatum Chamisso are not found to grow together with Hydrilla verticillata (L.f.) Royle in India. An experimental study shows that Hydrilla is allelopathic to the two species of Ceratophyllum and inhibits their growth. Thus, the distribution of Ceratophyllum species is limited by the presence of Hydrilla.

This paper briefly reviews the Indian studies on community structure, standing crops and primary production in inland freshwater wetlands. The problem and the state of wetland management in India has also been briefly discussed.