Pfafstetter Code Based Watershed Delimitation, Geological Observations, Land Cover, and Population Density Analysis for Mizoram Through Remote Sensing: Aiding and/or Improvising the Digital Watershed Atlas of India

Integrated Watershed Management cannot proceed without watershed delimitation and this not an easy task. Further, in a landscape dissected and dominated with water in a hill topography, this task becomes challenging yet entrancing. For the state of Mizoram, these aspects are pertinent for the geology marked by uncountable hydrological systems. Remote Sensing technology can prove to be a highly effective tool in this as it can help observe the dynamic landscapes over a period of time, which otherwise is a daunting task to do in the field. The current attempt tends to provide an unfollowed, state of the art method to observe the alternative to the existing planning boundaries for watersheds and similar units. Currently, it is the Digital Watershed Atlas of India that provides a schema for such a planning. With its roots based in spatial scale for watershed delineation, the present attempt tends to create these planning regions by taking natural drainage as the determining factor. The current study is an attempt to provide a perspective to the existing delimitation with the help of remote sensing through the well known Pfafstetter Code of watershed delimitation. This analysis is supplemented with observations on the existing geology of water flow, land cover, and population density of the state. Such an attempt is not observed for the north-east in general and the state of Mizoram in particular. It can help in providing an alternative strategy, aiding or improvising the existing watershed delimitation and also in updating the development measures with regards to existing geology and occupation of space.