Assessment of Heavy Metals and Associated Health Risk with the Consumption of Vegetables Grown in the Flood Plains of River Yamuna in Delhi

Abstract

The present study assesses the levels of heavy metals and their risk on human health through ingestion of commonly grown vegetables in floodplain of Yamuna river stretch of Delhi. The metal content in soils collected from different locations of the floodplain were in the order of Fe > Mn > Cr > Zn > Ni > Cu > Co > Pb > Cd > Hg and were within the permissible limits of MoEF & CC, 2015 except Cd. Significantly high correlation was found among concentration of metals in soil between Ni-Co, Ni-Mn, Cr-Pb, Cr-Zn, Cu-Zn, Cu-Pb, Cu-Cr and Zn-Pb which could be due to similar anthropogenic sources. The Pollution load index of soils fell under the category of baseline level of pollutants and the Ecological risk index was also found low. The levels of metal intake (Zn, Cu, Ni, Cd and Hg) through vegetables grown in floodplains were found within the permissible limit of FSSAI 2011except for Pb, where the concentration exceeded the standard limit. The Health Risk Index (HRI), in vegetables for all metals were found < 1.0 and was found safe except for Spinach and Brinjal, wherein the HRI value of Pb was 1.09 and1.01 respectively which was found slightly higher than 1.0 which indicates matter of concern and requires regular monitoring to ascertain the levels of metals within the safe limits of human consumption.