Selective Studies of Industrial Effluents for the Betterment of Mankind

Manufacturing industries are engaged in transforming raw material into finished products

which can be consumer or producer goods e.g. chemical, textile, paper and pulp, food,

metal industry, etc. The manufacturing units play an important role in the process of

economic development of a country by supplying the goods and materials to consumers

and enhance the economic welfare of citizens.

Though the main occupation of the bulk of the Indian population has been agriculture,

recently India is moving towards rapid industrialization. The number of industries has

increased manifold in the last few decades and almost all types of manufacturing plants

are existing or are being set up in different geographical areas of the country. Here, about

7500 large scale and a very large number of small and medium enterprises (SME's) are in

operation. The Small and Medium Scale Industries are the backbone of the Indian

economy. There are 3 million SMEs in the country as against a mere 2000 industries in

the large scale sector. The SMEs spread over an area of 3.28 million sq. km account for

over 40% of the industrial production and 30% of the country's export. Small scale

industries are discussed all over the states and they satisfy local demand. Thus, they play

a critical role in the development of those regions. SSI has been very helpful in the

generation of revenue mainly through the export of goods and addressing problems such

as employment and at the same time, it has raised the socio-economic condition of

people. Madhya Pradesh has fifty-two districts but the industrial development is in hardly

20 % of the total.

Industrialization generally refers to the growth of large, medium, and small scale

industries. Indeed, backward areas cannot support large scale industries in large numbers

because they do not consider necessary backward and forward linkages for their

development. Here the medium and small scale enterprises are ideally suited to these

areas in terms of flexibility.

Effluent defined by the United States Environmental Protection

Agency as "treated or untreated wastewater that flows out of a treatment plant, sewer, or

industrial outfall"73. The industrial effluent is specific and particular to industry, each

having its undesirable waste constituents. Generally, Industrial effluent can be divided

into Organic Industrial effluent and Inorganic Industrial effluent.

Organic Industrial effluents contain Organic Industrial waste flow from those chemical

industries and large scale chemical works, which mainly use organic substances for

chemical reactions or operations