Spatial and temporal changes in the pH, electrical conductivity (EC), TDS, TSS, BOD, COD and concentration of toxic metals viz. cadmium (Cd), iron (Fe), chromium (Cr), lead (Pb), nickel (Ni), zinc (Zn) and copper (Cu) were assessed in the waste water contaminated with untreated or inadequately pretreated industrial effluents from pharmaceutical industries located in Selaqui area and sugar industry and distillery located in Doiwala area of Dehradun. Four effluent samples A, B, C, D collected from manufacturing and processing industries located in the study area and two ground water samples E1 & E2 contiguous to Selaqui industrial hub and Doiwala industrial stretch respectively, were analyzed using standard physico-chemical methods. In order to delimit the temporal changes in parameters, samples were collected in three batches at three consecutive seasons of a year. Analyses at STP condition revealed that pH values of ground water samples remained fairly unchanged at 7.01 + 0.14 & 6.98 + 0.04 for E1 & E2 respectively, for two regional variations and three seasonal variations. EC (mmho/cm) varied non-uniformly with highest value of 0.479 observed for sample A in batch 1 whereas lowest value of 0.122 recorded for sample D in batch 3. TDS in effluents of distillery and sugar industry were found to be 3-6 folds higher than the same for effluents from pharmaceutical industries across all seasons. BOD and COD values for the effluents of distillery and sugar industries were recorded unexpectedly higher than corresponding values in effluents from pharmaceutical industries in all the three batches. TSS was very high in the range of 1500 to 4500 mg/l in all the effluent samples except the ground water samples. Highest concentration of heavy metal detected was iron with concentration of 10.80 mg/l. Cr, Pb, Cd and Ni were found to be above the permissible limit recommended by WHO standards. A plausible analysis is made to interpret the wide range variation of the parameters in the light of spatial and temporal change aspects and necessary pretreatment measures to bring down the magnitude of contamination within consent level are suggested.