Morphologically different, three bacterial strains, capable of decolorizing Reactive Blue 59 were isolated from dye effluent contaminated soil sample, collected from Ichalkaranji, India. The individual bacterial strains viz. Bacillus odysseyi SUK3, Morganella morganii SUK5 and Proteus sp. SUK7 decolorized Reactive Blue 59 (50 mg l(-1)) completely within 60, 30, 24 h, respectively, while the bacterial consortium PMB11 of these strains required 3 h for the complete decolorization. The decolorization was confirmed by UV-Vis spectroscopy. Further, the biodegradation of Reactive Blue 59 in to different metabolites was confirmed by High performance liquid chromatography and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy analysis. Significant increase in the activity of aminopyrine N-demethylase (AND) in the individual as well consortium cells, obtained after decolorization showed involvement of AND in the decolorization process. Phytotoxicity studies, revealed the nontoxic nature of the degraded metabolites of Reactive Blue 59 indicating effectiveness of bacterial consortium PMB11 for the treatment of textile effluent containing Reactive Blue 59.