A unique campaign being conducted under the banner of Maa Ganga Ahawan Akhara to free the river Ganga from immersion of idols completed its eighteenth round.
In the past, several initiatives have been launched to free the river from garbage, debris and litters that clog the flow of river Ganga by several organisations. However, things have not improved much.
The drive involves lifting of idols immersed in the river by devotees coming here from across the country. During the drive, initiative was also taken to educate the communities living nearby about the effects of pollution and the need to clean the river to maintain the ecological balance of the river. Several toxic pollutants were removed from the surface of the river during the cleaning process. Till now, over 500 idols have been removed from Ganga alone from different ghats of Haridwar.
Dinesh Joshi, convener of the drive, said that this was not just a cleaning and awareness drive, but rather an effort to motivate people for taking proactive initiatives at individual level to ensure a better future for the river and for the communities affected by the contamination.
JP Badoni, Maa Ganga Ahawan Akhara activist, said that the drive is conducted every Wednesday. “It has completed its 18th round on this Wednesday,” he added.
Rameshwar Gaur, another activist, said that they will soon write to the district administration to make further arrangement to retain the beauty of ghats and continuous flow of Ganga in the holy city by deploying police personnel and setting up warning/notice boards in the nearby areas. He further added that on first day, hardly a dozen of people had gathered for the drive. “Now, over two dozen volunteers are sharing their hands of their own volition. However, it is a pity that only dozens have come forward while district has a population of over nineteen lakhs,” he said. Sudhanshu Mishra, Mayur, Ajay Sharma, Basu Thakur, Rameshwar Gaud, Anil Saini, Vicky, Shiv Kumar, Raju Jaiswal, Monu Tomar, Amrit lal, Dipu, Prempal, Kamlesh, Manish, Tesu and Raj were among those who volunteered.