The river water quality monitoring is most vital aspect for various uses. Diatoms are an ecologically important group in most aquatic ecosystems but are often ignored as indicators of river environment change. Diatoms are used as bio-indicators to assess the water quality of surface waters. Diatoms are used as bio-indicators to assess the water quality of surface waters. Sixty (60) species belonging to 21 genera are recorded from cauvery river. Water samples are assessed by analyzing the various physico-chemical parameters, such as pH, electrical conductivity (μs/cm), dissolved solid (mg/l), biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) (mg/l), calcium (Ca) (mg/l), magnesium (Mg) (mg/l), sodium (Na) (mg/l), potassium (K) (mg/l), chloride (Cl) (mg/l), bicarbonate (HCO3) (mg/l) and sulphate (SO4) (mg/l). These 8 parameters are considered to compute the water quality index. The results of the present study on diatom assemblages in cauvery river at siluvampalayam and koneripatti indicates moderate pollution, while at peramachipalayam, kottampatty, sanyasipatti and bhavani shows high level of pollution. The water quality index reveals that water of river cauvery to be unpolluted in the upstream of the city and unfit for human consumption towards the downstream at bhavani town. The values of DO and BOD levels indicate the absence of major organic pollution sources. In the present study an attempt has been made to evaluate the applicability of diatom based indices for water quality assessment in cauvery river in part of Tamil Nadu. The results of the present study shows that the Cauvery river water is not polluted in mettur area whereas it is highly polluted near bhavani area. All results are compared with national river water quality standards.
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