Ganges More Polluted Than Ever, Says Scientist

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 8/27/2004 4:23:16 PM Eastern Daylight Time,

devi_bhakta writes:

At present, an estimated 114 cities spew filth into the Ganges,

resulting in the death of one person every minute due to diarrhoea

in the river basin, Mishra said quoting WHO.

Yikes! And I drank that stuff when I was in Bengal....thank the gods for not

killing me!

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

New Delhi, INDIA (August 27, 2004): A 20-year-old government project

to cleanse the Ganges of pollutants has "utterly failed" in changing

the fetid condition of the river that continues to acquire tonnes of

wastes every day, a scientist said Friday.

 

Scientist Veer Bhadra Mishra, who launched the Swatcha Ganga

Abhiyaan or Campaign for Clean Ganga in the 1980s, alleged that the

grand Ganga Action Plan (GAP) had become a victim of poor technical

planning and financial irregularities.

 

As a result of the government's laxity, the river has become more

polluted than ever and faecal-coliform levels have reached up to

47,000 times the Indian standard for human bathing.

 

Faecal-coliform is a measurement of human and animal waste in water.

But many Indians still argue that Ganges is a divine goddess and is

capable of cleansing herself.

 

"People say a single drop of Ganges water that grazes your cheek can

cleanse a lifetime of sins. But can that drop, befouled by the

effects of raw sewage, faecal-coliform, industrial effluents,

floating animal carcasses and human corpses, cleanse your body?"

asked Mishra, who was named one of Time magazine's 'Heroes of the

Planet' for his efforts to clean one of the world's oldest rivers.

 

Dismissing theories about the Ganges' miraculous powers as a

fallacy, he called upon environmentalists to create public pressure

for cleaning the river and its banks by smashing through the

firewall of political apathy.

 

He pointed out that the Swatcha Ganga Abhiyaan in cooperation with

the University of California had developed a non-electrical,

technical solution to clean the river along the ghats of the holy

city of Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.

 

"This plan neither requires huge financial investments nor consumes

electricity and has been endorsed by the Varanasi City Corporation,"

he said.

 

British High Commissioner to India Michael Arthur has extended his

support for the project that aims at stopping sewage discharge into

the river.

 

At present, an estimated 114 cities spew filth into the Ganges,

resulting in the death of one person every minute due to diarrhoea

in the river basin, Mishra said quoting WHO.

 

Stating that self-help was the best help, Mishra, a former professor

of hydraulic engineering, called upon civil society organisations to

contribute to the initiative.

 

He also urged the Congress-led government to revive the GAP,

launched in 1985 by then Congress prime minister Rajiv Gandhi.

 

Source: Indo-Asian News Service

URL: http://www.keralanext.com/news/readnext,1.asp?id=45809&pg=2

[Guest guest]

, swastik108@a... wrote:

> In a message dated 8/27/2004 4:23:16 PM Eastern Daylight Time,

> devi_bhakta writes:

> At present, an estimated 114 cities spew filth into the Ganges,

> resulting in the death of one person every minute due to diarrhoea

> in the river basin, Mishra said quoting WHO.

 

This conclusion does not seemed to be based on facts; diarrhoea can

be due to any number of reasons especially in overcrowded tenements

and slums along the river, is there any specific evidence that the

cause is Ganges water. To the contrary, the magical properties of

Ganges river have been well known

 

http://fusionanomaly.net/ganges.html

http://www.newfarm.org/books/reviews/june04/water_print.shtml

 

Of course this is not an excuse for not cleaning up the Ganges, which

without a doubt is long overdue.

 

-yogaman