NEW DELHI, India; Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi on Saturday inaugurated a $34.4 million project to clean up one of the holiest and most polluted stretches of the Ganges River.
“The river not only embodies ‘our spiritual heritage but is a symbol of unity and tolerance,” the United News of India quoted Ganhi as saying at a ceremony in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi.
The cleanup at Varanasi in the northeastern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, is part of a five-year, $232 million program to clean the entire Ganges. The larger program, which began last year, calls for construction of sewage treatment plants, drinking water purification systems and improved trash disposal sites at 30 cities.
Millions of Hindus travel to the Ganges each year to cleanse themselves in its sacred waters despite
I massive pollution from raw sewage, industrial wastes and partially burned corpses from riverside cremation sites. A recent government study found cholera, dysentery and typhoid germs in the river.
‘At Varanasi, formerly called Benaras, the government plans to build three sewage treatment to stop the flow of an estimated 26 million gallons of untreated sewage into the river each day, set up landfill sites and aid local authorities in improving cremation procedures,
‘The increasing number of partially cremated or unburned bodies being deposited in the river has been blamed on the inability of the poor to pay for firewood.
Dr. BS. Mehta, former president of the Indian Medical Association in Varanasi, estimates that 98 percent of Varanasi’s 1 million people suffer from stomach disorders caused by bathing in and drinking the polluted water.
Article extracted from this publication >> June 20, 1986
