The Great Indian Desert (Thar Desert) spanning over 2 lakh acres currently houses or plans to house various major infrastructure including roads, railways, airways, defense structures, solar structures, wind turbines, etc. The Thar Desert contains several sand dunes of varying shapes and geometry. These sand dunes are prone to severe migration due to intense aeolian activity, particularly during the peak summer seasons during which the critical infrastructure is often inundated. Understanding the behavior of such migrating soils and their characterization in terms of engineering parameters is essential. Soils of Rajasthan are mostly aeolian type and are classified as metastable, which are not suitable for construction purposes.

Rajasthan is famous for its natural deposits such as limestone, granite, marble, etc. In recent decades, there has been a demand for these stones, and it is observed that in Rajasthan alone, approximately six million tons of marble slurry is generated per annum that is dumped along public places or near the processing units. This study proposes to integrate these two challenges by utilizing the scrapped marble slurry as a potential stabilizer to mitigate sand dune migration in the Thar Desert. Field visits are conducted across various locations in the Thar Desert and marble slurry dumping yards to collect specimens. Experimental investigations are performed to explore the mitigative surface treatment effect of marble slurry on the sandy specimens.

In the first phase of the work, field visits are conducted at various locations of the Jodhpur district of Rajasthan and soil samples are collected from western Jodhpur, closer to the Thar Desert. Laboratory tests are conducted to comprehensively characterize the sampled soils. An inventory of test data and analysis has been provided which could be useful for migration analysis, foundation design, and soil improvement in the region.