Water-induced erosion potentiality and vulnerability assessment in Kangsabati river basin, eastern India

The large-scale water-induced erosion is one of the most determining elements on land degradation in subtropical monsoon-dominated region. From this large-scale erosion, the fertility of the agricultural land has been decline consequently. So, estimation of the amount of erosion and its accurate prediction is necessary for escaping from this hazardous situation. In this study, the application of evidential belief function (EBF), spatial logistic regression (SLR) and ensemble of EBF and SLR to estimate the erosion potentiality with the help of ArcGIS and Soil and water assessment tool (SWAT). The average annual soil erosion has been estimated with the help of revised universal soil loss equation (RUSLE) and geographical information system (GIS). Apart from this to evaluate the importance of morphotectonic parameters on soil erosion, the correlation between erosion potentiality and average annual soil erosion has been quantified. In large-scale erosion, there is a direct impact of storm rainfall event in monsoon period in the entire subtropical region. Here, in erosion potentiality assessment, the optimal capacity of ensemble EBF-SLR is higher than the single alone methods, i.e., EBF and SLR. So, the mentioned approaches can be applied in soil erosion research in subtropical environment with considering the erosion causal parameters. This type of information can be helpful to the decision-maker and stakeholders to take proper initiative to reducing the rate of erosion. The main task of the future researcher is to implement this method more accurate ways with considering more reliable variables and slight modifications of the approaches in keeping in the view of regional environment. � 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.