Court says plan to clean Ganga river is not practical

GOVERNMENT TOLD TO FRAME TIME- BOUND AND REALISTICALLY ACHIEVABLE BLUEPRINT

India’s Supreme Court yesterday expressed its dissatisfaction over the Narendra Modi government’s much touted Ganga clean- up action plan.

The two- member bench of Justices T. S. Thakur and R. Banumathi instructed the government to come back to it within three weeks with a time- bound and realistically achievable plan.

“Don’t give us a vision plan, an artist’s view. After seeing your action plan, it seems Ganga will not be cleaned even after 200 years. You should take steps so that Ganga gets its pristine glory and future generations can see it. We don’t know whether it will happen in our generation,” the apex court bench observed.

In its 29- page affidavit filed before the court on Tuesday, the Modi government had said that itwas committed to cleaning the river since it formed part of its election promise. The government said that it has now been deemed as a national priority and a group of professionals have been tasked to finalise the plan by the end of this year.

“Can you indicate the stages through which this plan has to move and the time involved in each stage?” Justice Thakur asked solicitor general Ranjit Kumar.

Terming the affidavit too bureaucratic for a layman to understand, the court asked for a PowerPoint presentation with a stage- by- stage plan to clean the 2,525km long Holy River that originates in the Himalayas and merges into the Bay of Bengal after flowing through the states of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal.

Millions wasted

Millions of rupees have been wasted or siphoned off since the Ganga Action Plan was first launched by the Rajiv Gandhi government in 1985.

The urgent need to clean the ancient river Ganga came into focus after Narendra Modi decided to seek election from Varanasi, which is situated on the banks of river.

The apex court offered the solicitor general help by directing closure of polluting industries when the solicitor general said that he refused to take a dip in the river when asked during his recent visit to Allahabad. It also asked the government to be categorical in how much success can be achieved in the next five years when Modi’s termends.

The Supreme Court had on August 13 asked the government for a status report on its action plan to clean the Ganga.