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Relook at ‘Namami Gange’

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November 19, 2018

What is the issue?

  • Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently inaugurated India’s first multi-modal terminal on the Ganga river at Varanasi.
  • In this context, the government's approach in ‘Namami Gange’ (National Mission for Clean Ganga) raises serious environmental concerns.

What are the concerns?

  • Lack of proper impact assessment due to development activities in the Ganga basin has resulted in deterioration of river Ganga.
  • Reports and statements from various official sources including the CAG and NGT suggest the deteriorating nature of Ganga river.
  • The government is, in fact, doing a lot that adversely affects the river.
  • These include the
  1. continued onslaught of hydropower projects
  2. inter-linking of rivers, waterways, dredging, river front development
  3. Char Dham Highway
  4. even Swachh Bharat Abhiyan
  • Unsustainable sand mining, river encroachments and extraction of groundwater and other resources are continuing at increasing rates.

What should be done?

  • Government has to come up with a credible road map, and set up pilots.
  • It should ensure that existing sewage and industrial effluent treatment plants work as per design, and also set up decentralised STPs (sewage treatment plant).
  • Eco-friendly treatment options should be opted.
  • The government should also take steps to reduce sugarcane cultivation and promote water-saving and yield-enhancing cultivation methods.
  • These efforts, if taken, could have helped improve the state of flow in the Ganga river.
  • Above all, the government must make river governance democratic, with clearly defined norms of transparency, participation and accountability.

 

Source: BusinessLine

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