Mrs Saranya’s scientific contributions

Groundwater is one of the most precious natural resources for the substance of life on the earth. The present study aims to assess the groundwater potential zones in the Varthur Catchment of Dakshina Pinakini River Basin, Karnataka using remote sensing, geographical information system (GIS) and multi influencing factors. The first step, the groundwater influencing factors such as drainage density, geology, slope, lineament density, geomorphology, land use / land cover and soil are generated using geospatial techniques. Each every theme is converted to raster format and assigning scores and weights computed from multi influencing factor (MIF) technique. Then, all the parameters are statistically computed and integrated to assess the groundwater potential zones in the study area. The output map is classified into five categories like very low, low, moderate, high and very high. The demarcated groundwater potential map is validated with the well location data using R-index method. The results will be useful for extraction and management of groundwater in the study area.