Those polluting Ganga and its tributaries will be dealt with sternly in the days to come. The Ministry of Water Resources and Ganga Rejuvenation has proposed to set up a statutory body to take action against the industrial polluters of the rivers. Presently there is only the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) that can act only as per the recommendations of Ministry against polluting units.
In an informal meet with the Press on Tuesday, Water Resources and Gange Rejuvenation Minister Uma Bharati said, The proposed authority can issue show cause notices under the Section five of Environment Protection Act (EPA), 1986, or can direct any other authority, including the Chief Secretary of a State to take action against the polluters. "If they fail to take action, the proposed authority will be empowered to approach the court, seeking to impose penalty on the polluters concerned," said Bharati.
The draft of the proposal has been given to the law Ministry for its consideration and is expected to be put before the Union Cabinet for its approval soon. Bharti said her ministry has not yet decided on the name of the proposed authority. She, however suggested that the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NCMG), which is currently a registered society, could well be that authority.
Bharati also informed of setting out on a two-year-long foot march from October to ensure that the Namami Gange programme is implemented in the desired manner , besides seeking suggestions on other issues as the proposed Ganga Act which the ministry is contemplating on.
The draft of Ganga Act is being prepared by two high level committees that have been entrusted with responsibility of preparing its draft. The proposed Act, aims at fast tracking the implementation of the programme and prepare guidelines to clean the river of silt.
Further, in order to ensure transparency and efficiency in Ganga related work, the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) has written to the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) for conducting concurrent audit of transactions in the mission. There has been a quantum jump of `20,000 crore in funds handled by the NMCG and an audit by CAG will help in ensuring economic, efficient and faithful discharge of given mandate.
The sources in the Ministry said that NMCG is also working on a system of internal audit whereby a firm of chartered accountants, selected through bidding would carry out the internal audit of mission at quarterly intervals.