Indian Journal of Geo Marine Sciences Vol. 48 (12), December 2019, pp. 1933-1940 Development of CCME WQI model for the groundwater appraisal for drinking in Basaltic terrain of Kadava River basin, Nashik, India Vasant Wagh 1 *, Shrikant Mukate 1 , Dipak Panaskar 1 , Uday Sahu 2 , Manesh Aamalawar 1 , & Aniket Muley 3 Yogesh Lolage 1 1 School of Earth Sciences, SRTM University, Nanded, Maharashtra, India 2 Toshniwal College of Arts, Commerce and Science College, Sengaon, Hingoli, Maharashtra, India 3 School of Mathematical Sciences, SRTM University, Nanded, Maharashtra, India *[E-mail: wagh.vasant@gmail.com] Received 04 May 2018; revised 6 June 2018 In this study, Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment, Water Quality Index (CCMEWQI) model has been used to ascertain the groundwater suitability for drinking in Kadava River basin located in Nashik district, Maharashtra. Therefore, forty (40) representative groundwater samples were collected from different dug/bore well during Pre (PRM) and Post (POM) monsoon seasons of 2011 and analyzed by standard procedures of APHA. The parameters like pH, EC, TDS, TH, Ca, Mg, Na, K, Cl, F, SO 4 and NO 3 were considered to compute the CCME WQI model. The results of CCME WQI values inferred that 7.5 % in PRM and 17.5 % samples in POM seasons fall in poor category. Moreover, 77.5 % and 60 % samples fall in marginal category in PRM and POM seasons. While, 15 % and 22.5 % samples came under fair category in PRM and POM seasons. Spatial distribution maps illustrated that North, Central and South regions are identified as vulnerable for drinking; hence, unfit for drinking. In a nutshell, groundwater quality is significantly deteriorated because of agricultural practices and anthropogenic activities, therefore appropriate monitoring along with proper remedial measures is essential to sustain the groundwater quality in the river basin. [Keywords: CCME WQI model; Drinking suitability; Groundwater; Kadava River] Introduction Water is important and infinite natural source for the endurance of life and one of the essential components of human health system. The water quality of drinking water is ultimately associated with human health, because of consumption of contaminated drinking water possess many water borne diseases from local to global scale 1 . The water- borne diseases resulted to serious threats to public health and augmented the morbidity and mortality rate particularly in children 2,3 . It is estimated that in developing countries around 250 million populations infected yearly which led to 10-20 million deaths globally 4,5 . Over the period of time, owing to limited fresh water resources, people widely use groundwater for mitigating the needs of drinking, irrigation, industry etc. It is assumed that groundwater is one of the safe and reliable sources of drinking water owing to its natural quality and less susceptibility compared with freshwater resources. In fact one third part of the world population meets their drinking needs from ground water 6 . In general, groundwater quality depends on composition of rock, rock-water interface, water residence time, variability in climate and rainfall, water depth, soil media etc., and anthropogenic inputs from domestic, agricultural and industrial activities 7-16 . Thus, for sustainable water resource management, water quality evaluation is more vital in relation to public health and socio- economic development local to global scale 17-19 . Therefore, water quality monitoring programme is essential for sustainable management of available water resources and mitigate water quality issues in different regions. Water quality index (WQI) is one of the useful mathematical tools and a complex indicator of water quality that gives relative information based on diverse water quality variables into a single numerical value which can be simply communicated to public 20-23 . The most improvement advantage of WQI is estimation of water quality condition devoid of interpreting the individual water quality variables separately. Nonetheless, more than 20 WQI were formulated and used for water quality assessment worldwide 24-26 . Furthermore, the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment (CCME) has designed an index to make simpler the water quality data with no losing its scientific base which is practicable to use