Spatial-temporal Trends Mapping and Geostatistical Modelling of Groundwater Level Depth Over Northern Parts of Indo-Gangetic Basin, India

Haryana-Punjab is a vast part of the Indo-Gangetic basin (India), recognised globally as a major hotspot of groundwater abstraction and agricultural economic reliance. A lack of information is present in this region regarding spatiotemporal changes in groundwater levels. Geostatistical anisotropic processes are reliable, especially when the monitored regions are extensive. The modelling study involves a twofold objective. First, it estimates and evaluates anisotropic spatial variations in groundwater level depth (GWD, Surface to water level) using geostatistics for all four seasons of Indian cropping patterns—pre-monsoon, monsoon, post-monsoon (rabi) and post-monsoon (Kharif), and parameters of point kriging cross-validation (PKCV) are optimum, acceptable, and support the unbiasedness hypothesis of kriging. Based on the PKCV, five essential parameters were computed to accept the anisotropy semi-variogram fitted model. These are (1) kriging mean error (KME), ideally close to zero so that there are no over or underestimates, (2) goodness of fit (R2), (3) the ratio of estimated variance (EV) to kriging variance (KV) lies between 0.95-1.05, (4) good eye visualisation fit and (5) significant t-test on the correlation coefficient. The second objective is spatiotemporal modelling, a pixel-based Mann-Kendall trend testing (at 95% Confidence Interval) on kriged raster surfaces of GWD (For all four seasons) at 1km grid resolution. The trend, significant or not, is determined by the Mann-Kendall test, while Sen's slope estimator determines the slope magnitude of the trend. Results revealed that the study area's east-central to the central-northern region comes under a high depletion zone for groundwater levels. GWD significantly increased by 120cm/year-80cm/year in this region, and the mean kriged GWD for the entire study area increased by 30cm/year-29cm/year over 25 years. Seasonal climatological mean maps of kriged surfaces of GWD and mean rainfall surfaces in two different time phases for all four seasons have been evaluated. It is observed from these maps that wherever the rainfall is increasing, GWD is decreasing. Results clarified that anisotropic semi-variogram modelling with kriging, pixel-based trend analysis, and regression studies is a valuable tool for identifying the critical region of groundwater levels, and the central region of the study area falls under the severe depletion condition of the groundwater level.