Cyto-genotoxic consequences of carbendazim treatment monitored by cytogenetical analysis using Allium root tip bioassay Sonam Verma & Alka Srivastava Received: 16 June 2017 /Accepted: 12 March 2018 # Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018 Abstract Environmental pollution is one of the major problems of these days. One of the reasons of environ- mental pollution is the indiscriminate use of agrochemi- cals in agriculture. Fungicides are being extensively used in agriculture for enhancing crop yield and growth by controlling fungal growth. Fungicide carbendazim is widely applied to soil and seeds of vegetable/cereal crops in India and is effective against a very broad spectrum of fungi. The present study was designed to monitor the cyto-genotoxic effects of carbendazim directly in treated soils by cytogenetical analysis using Allium cepa root tip bioassay. In a pot experiment, fungicide carbendazim was added to soil at the rates of 2.5, 5, 7.5, and 10 mg kg -1 soil and uniform size onion bulb was planted in each pot, and three replicates were maintained for each dose at 1, 7, 15, 30, and 45 days after application and roots from onion bulbs were fixed for cytogenetical analysis. Findings indicate that carbendazim treatment leads to a significant dose and duration-dependent decrease in percent mitotic index with related increase in mitotic inhibition. Statisti- cal analysis showed a significant effect of carbendazim doses and duration of treatment on the percentage relative abnormality rate of A. cepa. Phase indices of our study showed high numbers of cells in prophase as com- pared to other phases at some doses of treatment. The different types of chromosomal abnormalities ob- served in our study serve as indicators of genotoxicity of carbendazim and we report for the first time the effect of its application directly in soil using a plant test system. Keywords Carbendazim . C-metaphase . Cyto-genotoxic . Cytogenetical . Fungicide Introduction Environmental pollution has increased due to the increas- ing population and related human activities. Agrochemi- cals essential for efficient crop production are major pollution source. Extensive application of agrochemicals in agriculture has led to their augmented accumulation in soil, water, and air (Bolognesi and Merlo 2011; Harnpicharnchai et al. 2013), which is followed by bio- accumulation and occasionally, it leads to influx in or- ganisms and hindering their metabolic processes which are common in both target and non-target organisms (Botías et al. 2016; Naksen et al. 2016). There is a growing concern worldwide over the random use of agrochemicals as it causes environmental pollution and also high acute toxicity problems which can deleteriously influence plant growth and development and can cause long-term damage to the environment by causing severe environmental pollution/toxicity and high impending risk to organisms even in trace levels (Mrema et al. 2013; Songa and Okonkwo 2016; Tsaboula et al. 2016). Fungicides are the common agrochemicals used against fungal diseases of agricultural crops. Fungicides are well known to affect the biochemical metabolism of Environ Monit Assess (2018) 190:238 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-018-6616-4 S. Verma : A. Srivastava (*) In Vitro Culture and Plant Genetics Unit, Department of Botany, Faculty of Science, University of Lucknow, Lucknow, UP 226007, India e-mail: alkasrivastava@hotmail.com