The National Mission for Clean Ganga had invited last year “expression of interest from registered firms for conducting environment and social audit of the project”. Under the same aegis, writers and artists of repute from across gathered at Matri Sadan Ashram in Haridwar on Monday, showing their commitment towards saving Ganga. The Garhwali folk singer Narendra Singh Negi was given “Ganga Gaurav” award by Swami Shivanand of Matri Sadan.
On the martyrs’ day that remembers Swami Nigamanand, who laid down his life for the cause of Ganga, writers and litterateurs gathered at Matri Sadan of Jagjeetpur. Film producer Anish Ranjan who has produced films of fame like Dil Me Mat le Yaar also joined the save Ganga campaign.
Speaking to The Pioneer, Ranjan said, “Ganga has reached a sorry state as far as cleanliness is concerned. We are fighting to save our holy river which has become a drain. We have decided to conduct social audit and will collect water samples from Gangotri to Ganga Sagar to examine the water quality of Ganga. After two years, we will publish the report about status of Ganga water.”
Screen play writer Nilesh Upadhyay who wrote the script of tele serial ‘Devon Ke Dev Mahadev’ said that he would meet Uttrakhand Chief Minister Harish Rawat along with his friends and ask him to clear his stand on this issue of Ganga. “We will also meet with CMs of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and Bengal as part of social audit and ask them to get samples of Ganga water tested in government labs,” he said.
Notably, these writers had met earlier on social media site and raised the concern of saving Ganga which brought them together on this day. They came after completing their journey from Gangotri to Haridwar and would be traversing the course of journey till Gangasagar.
When asked on the issue of censorship of movie “Udta Punjab” Anish said that Government was trying to regulate their creativity as it regulated the rivers and nature.
Earlier, when Narendra Singh Negi sang song on Ganga which he had composed in 1982 on the formation of Tehri dam and the apathy meted out to Ganga river, it made tears roll out from the eyes of many of those present.