Polluting Gomti, regularly, religiously

| TNN | Feb 3, 2014, 02.05 AM IST
LUCKNOW: All the material used in religious rituals are dispersed in nullahs and rivers which pollutes water bodies while the banks of the river remain piled with such wastes. Objects of worship like idols in all their finery are dumped irreverently into the Gomti river and littered around trunks of trees.

UP Pollution Control Board's last year report mentioned that water quality of Gomti has been deteriorating constantly since 2009 due to untreated waste being thrown daily into the river. While Lucknow Municipal Corporation's ambitious project, the 'municipal solid waste treatment plant' in Shivri village, could be the remedy to disposal of tonnes of garbage generated daily in city, while devising a separate mechanism for disposal of ritual waste poses a big challenge for the LMC.

People don't just throw idols and ritual materials like flowers, incense sticks, food, sweets, clothes, etc into the river, they pack everything in polythene bags and flow them into the river. Visitors to most temples too throw material on the river banks. LMC feels helpless as it cannot take the risk to hurt religious sentiments.

LMC, nonetheless, did devise a model strategy last year to take care of the situation. On instructions of the mayor Dinesh Sharma had got last year huge pits dfug up for dumping of ritual waste separately at Khatu Shyam Vatika, near Gomti. Separate trucks were deployed for collecting waste from major temples of the city and dumped inside the pit to decompose for days. This waste converted into manure and was given free to the Lucknow Nagar Nigam parks and to small-scale entrepreneurs for making incense sticks.

Sharma said "it was a novel concept to solve pollution problem and at the same time take care of religious sentiments while generating raw material for production and manure for parks on the other hand. The concept was highly appreciated and followed in Korea and Mauritius too." He said the response of the city, however, was not satisfactory as many small temples are continuing the tradition of throwing waste on the river bank.

There are about 150 major temples and 700 smaller temples around the city which altogether generate 500kg of waste everyday. LMC has deployed separate trucks to collect waste from temples but only a few are coming forward to cooperate with the corporation and let them collect the waste regularly. Sharma appealed that more temples should take up this initiative and educate their followers to adopt the concept.

TOI surveyed the banks of Gomti and found piles of flowers, foodstuff and idols dumped on the bank. Amit Verma resident of Alambagh said "it is unfortunate to see people spoiling the sanctity of a ritual by throwing its material near trees and banks with dogs and stray cattle walking all over them. Why don't people dispose of it responsibly? Don't they realise that if they throw it in rivers considering them pure, for how long will the rivers keep their purity if stuff is dumped into them regularly?"

The mayor exhorted resident welfare associations to come forward and create pits in parks of their localities into which residents could dump waste of rituals. This would provide free manure for development of the park and also solve problem of river pollution.

He informed that he had built huge fences around river bridges to prevent people from throwing polythene bags of ritual materials into the river but people climb up the pillars to pop waste into the river. "People need to be educated more about our idea and persuaded to give waste of rituals to LMC for proper utilisation. The manure can help grow greenery in parks as LMC spends crores of rupees annually on manure," he asked.

LMC puts up hoardings and banners with this message across the city every year during Navaratras. Mayor also implemented a rain water harvesting project at Mankameshwar Mandir to store milk and water offered to the deities which earlier flowed into drains. He has asked people and temple committees to make such low coast projects in their temples to help maintaining the ground water table of the area.

Reformative measures:

* LMC has created a huge pit for storing ritual waste of temples near Khatu Shyam Vatika

* Priests can call LMC's RR department at 9415004576 to send mini-trucks to temples

* Separate trucks deployed to carry ritual material that visit every week

* Waste converts into manure, used in 1,680 parks of Nagar Nigam

* LMC has appealed to residents to create smaller pits in parks of localities

* Residents can dump rituals waste in pits and converted manure can be used for the park

* Temple committees can create rain water harvesting projects to stop wastage of water

* People should avoid throwing waste inside Gomti or on its banks

* LMC puts up hoardings & banners during Navaratras to create awareness on ritual waste disposal

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