HYDROGEOMORPHOLOGICAL STUDY BASED ON REMOTE-SENSING OF MULUG-TALUK, WARANGAL DISTRICT, ANDHRA-PRADESH, INDIA

Remote sensing (RS) applications have become an important tool for the rapid evaluation of water resources. This paper deals with the utiliz ation of RS data as the main input in an integrated approach for groun dwater targeting. The Mulug Taluk, with an areal extent of 3200 km(2), is one of the poor taluks in the Warangal District, Andhra Pradesh, I ndia. A hydrogeomorphological study based on remote sensing (Landsat 5 , TM) helped in establishing: (i) a broad demarcation of different lit hological units viz., old Pakhals, Vindhyans, Gondwanas and recent all uvium; (ii) erosional landforms (96%) viz., denudational hills, struct ural hills, mesa/buttes, linear ridges, a pediment inselberg complex, a shallow weathered pediplain, a moderately weathered pediplain and de positional landforms (4%) such as flood plain areas; and (iii) delinea tion of minor and major lineaments. The investigations revealed that t he potential for groundwater development is in the preferential order of alluvium, Gondwanas and Puranas. A statistical treatment of the dat a also confirmed that wells on lineaments yield more than wells away f rom lineaments. NE-SW structural trends cutting across the regional tr end appeared to be more favourable for the exploitation of baseflow fo r shallow groundwater development.