After Ram Mandir, it is the turn of the holy river, Ganga. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), in a bid to exploit emotional and spiritual attachment to the Ganga among the people, plans to launch a mass awareness campaign in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar and West Bengal to press "Nirmal Ganga, Aviral Ganga."
Incidentally, the campaign would be led by Uma Bharati who after her re-induction, campaigned for the BJP in the Uttar Pradesh elections. The party national executive passed a resolution deploring the failure of the Ganga River Basin Authority chaired by the prime Minister to find viable and enduring solutions to the various issues brought up by religious leaders, environmentalists and social activists in the insistent manner over the past several years.
BJP's move to choose the holy Ganga and its protection is aimed at increasing its presence in north India and also in Kolkata ahead of 2014 elections. The resolution made every attempt to touch upon the emotionally closed Ganga river as it said "Ganga Jal is believed to be holy not only because of the people's religious sentiments. The Ganga provides water to over 40% of India's population in 11 states. Sadly, even though the Ganga has nurtured and protected the Indian civilization over the millennia, today the river itself is in need of protection," the party said in its resolution.
According to the party, it was indeed an alarming situation that very little pure water was found in Prayag, where crores of devotees from all over the country and the world come for the Kumbh. No less worrying was the fact that, due to obstructions and diversions created by dams, long stretches of the river remain dry.
"The BJP regards this condition of the Ganga to be totally unacceptable. We believe that it is a pious national duty of the people and the governments to restore the purity and unobstructed natural flow of the Ganga and going forward of all the other rivers in India. The BJP resolves to carry forward the important legacy of Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviyaji whose 150th birth anniversary was celebrated last year," the party said.
BJP has demanded that the Ganga River Basin Authority be given a specific and time bound mandate to make the Ganga nirmal and aviral and the developmental, energy, financial needs of the riparian states be suitably borne by the central government since the Ganga has been accorded the status of India's national river. Further, the government should draw up strict guidelines for stopping the emission of untreated sewage and industrial effluents into the river, state and local self governments be assisted to set up sewage disposal and treatment plants for all untreated sewage.
Moreover, the party made a case for an enactment of law by the parliament to ensure that the Ganga was made nirmal and aviral by suitably strengthening and empowering the Ganga River Basin Authority.
