Abstract :
The megalopolis of Kolkata produces almost 750 million liters of wastewater and sewage every day and
the East Kolkata Wetlands works as a fully functional organic sewage management system. It can well
be described as the kidney of the city. It also acts as a natural flood control system for the city. It is ironic
that there is a little concern about the destruction of a world's important wet land site. Due to the rapid
urbanization and change of urban morphology in the last few decades survival of East KolkataWetlands
has become a challenge. The main objective of this study is to focus on the identification of changes in
landuse/ land cover from 1990 to 2017 in the East Kolkata Wetlands in order to understand the
underlying causes and also to identify the problems and challenges it faces currently. The methodology
includes the detailed preparation of landuse map of 1990 and 2017 from Landsat TM data and Landsat
Oli TRS. The analysis shows that the area under the settlements has increased from22.587 sq km in 1990
to 35.287 sq km in 2017 due to rapid urbanization with a consequent decrease of open spaces from
12.112 sq km in 1990 to 4.129sq km in 2017. All these have significantly compounded its sustainability
that would eventually affect the environmental health of the megalopolis in the long run.
Keyword :
Wetlands Landuse Sustainability Urbanisation Open space