Remote Sensing Application for Exploring Land Use and Land Cover Dynamics in and Around Chatra Wetland, English Bazar, West Bengal

Wetlands are often called as biological “supermarket” and “kidneys of the landscape” due to their multiple functions, including water purification, water storage, processing of carbon and other nutrients, stabilization of shorelines and support of aquatic lives. Unfortunately, although being dynamic and productive ecosystem, these wetlands have been affected by human induced land use changes. India is losing wetlands at the rate of 2 to 3 per cent each year due to over-population, direct deforestation, urban encroachment, over fishing, irrigation and agriculture etc (Prasher, 2018). The present study tries to investigate the nature and degree of land use/land cover transformation, their causes and resultant effects on Chatra Wetland. To fulfil the purpose of the study, GIS and remote sensing techniques have been employed. Satellite imageries have been used from United States Geological Survey (USGS) Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus and Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager for the year 2003 and 2018. Cloud free imageries of 2003 and 2018 have been downloaded from USGS (https://glovis.usgs.gov/) for the month of March and April respectively. Image processing, supervised classificationhas been done in ArcGis 10.5 and ERDAS IMAGINE 14. The study reveals that the settlement hasincreased by about 90.43 per cent in the last 15 years around the Chatra wetland within the bufferzone of 2 Sq km. Similarly agriculture, vegetation, water body, swamp and wasteland witnessed asignificant decrease by 5.94 per cent, 57.69 per cent, 26.64 per cent 4.52 per cent and 55.27 per centrespectively from 2003 to 2018.