Ganga Pollution: Experts to Take Call on Who's to be Blamed
Published on by Water Network Research, Official research team of The Water Network in Government
Progress on drafting a new law to protect the Ganga has run into a hurdle due to lack of consensus over what could be considered an offense and who should be held guilty of polluting the river.
Water Resources Minister Uma Bharati told The Indian Express that the proposed Ganga law would not be enacted “in a hurry” because that can put a large number of people in trouble.
“Everyone agrees that a law on Ganga is needed. But the draft as we have now is not complete… the question is who should be held guilty (of polluting the river)? About 20 lakh people bathe in the Ganga every day. Now, it shouldn’t be the case that anyone is picked up by police for leaving flowers or leaves in the river. So who should be held responsible? Who has to ensure that pollutants are not left in the river? These things have to be made very clear,” Bharati said.
A five-member committee headed by Justice (retd) Girdhar Malviya, constituted to frame a draft law on the Ganga, submitted its report to the Water Resources Ministry. The report has not been made public. Bharati said more consultations were being carried out. “We have referred the draft to experts. It is possible that more aspects will be added to the draft. The exercise is still incomplete,” she said.
Work on the legislation has been going on for more than three years. It began during the Manmohan Singh government, which had constituted an inter-ministerial committee in February 2014 for this purpose. Former Chief Vigilance Commissioner N Vittal, a member of the National Ganga River Basin Authority, was also asked to prepare a draft law. Another draft was being prepared by Ganga Mahasabha, a “pan-India organisation dedicated to nature and culture”.
The law seeks to make it illegal to pollute the Ganga. It would also make it a duty of the state governments to ensure that adequate flows are maintained in the river throughout its length.
Read more: Indian Express
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6 Comments
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Hesitation at Top to allow status quo or not punish the guilty of having brought our River Systems to its present plight would also get punished by Nature if not by the laws of the land.
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The bathing alone can contribute Kgs of BOD.. But we cannot say.. No, towards those people.
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Seems sensible to have a plan to tackle the worst polluters first but I guess it has to be done in such a way that does not force industry out of business.
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Bathing, flowers and even ashes are not the problem. It's untreated sewage and industrial waste.
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Any entity in the catchment of ganga which causes directly or indirectly discharges effluent (solid,liquid,gas,semisolid)into river with quality standard more than prescribed by Ganga law should be punished as per the discharge and quality of efflient
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Governments at Centre and states have been carrying burden of blame for being inefficient and guilty of taking no effective actions to book the culprits polluting the river systems in accordance with the laws of land. Now, the very logic of not taking quick steps to enact an improved law itself is SELF DEFEATING.. We know that a large no of agencies have brought our River Systems to their present state and why be considerate to them even if some Organs and ULBs get booked. Is it that now the RIVERS shall have to fend for themselves and move the Government/s to take actions to enable delivery of justice to them besides protecting their rights?