Textile and paper industry is one of the largest water consuming and water polluting industry as large amount of dyes are likely to be discharged into waste streams. Significant quantum of water is consumed for the preparation, dyeing, washing and rinsing stages of reactive dyeing processes. The textile/paper industry and con-sequently its wastewater have been increasing exponentially with the ever increasing demands. If these wastewaters are discharged to the environment without any treatment, these dyes can remain in the environment for an extended period of time due to their high
stability to light and temperature. The presence of even very low concentrations of dyes in effluent is highly undesirable. Dependingon the exposure time and dye concentration, dyes can have
acuteand/or chronic effects on exposed organisms. They also affect the absorption and reflection of sunlight through water, reduce oxy-gen solubility and threaten the photosynthetic activity of aquatic plants and algae. The effect in reduction in the oxygen levels inter-feres with the growth
of bacteria such that they become inefficientin biologically degrading impurities in the water
and hence riskthe food chain.