Abstract
India is one of the leading suppliers of agrochemicals and has the largest pesticide industry in Asia. Among various Indian states, Punjab is the primary user of pesticides. Presence of pesticide residue in water and food products of Punjab is well documented. The present study was designed to envisage the level of pesticide contamination in pond water of eleven villages of Amritsar district of Punjab, India. A rapid and concurrent method for the identification and quantification of pesticides in water samples was developed and validated. The method validation parameters exhibited high sensitivity of the developed method and the proficiency for the identification and quantification of pesticide residues in water samples. The RP-HPLC method described here •is a novel method which is applicable for simple, rapid and precise detection of pesticides.•40.02% of water samples were found contaminated with multi-residue pesticides.•carbofuran was the most abundant pesticide which was present in 18.18% samples.