Nashik Municipal Corporation (NMC) is all gung-ho as it goes building and sprucing up riverbanks along the Godavari so the formidable Kumbh Mela crowds may take a holy dip without feeling terribly crammed.
Nashik Municipal Corporation (NMC) is all gung-ho as it goes building and sprucing up riverbanks along the Godavari so the formidable Kumbh Mela crowds may take a holy dip without feeling terribly crammed.
Environmentalists, though, are concerned that the ablutions may not be all that holy given the effluents from sewage plants that flavour the river.
White foam, discharged from sewage treatment plants, covers the surface of the water at Tapovan, Takali and Dasak. At the Tapovan plant, 270 mlt sewage is treated daily and released into the river, and one can see a huge mass of foam swirling over the rover water.
Down the stream, Nasardi, which is more a sewer channel than a river, also meets the foam-laced Godavari water near Takali. The corporation is building new ghats for the Mela at this place, so people may cleanse themselves.
Further down, at Dasak, another sewage plant is under construction, and the outlet is already running. The frothy water enters the river here, and another new ghat is being built down from here.
Environmentalists who have taken the battle against river pollution to the court are now questioning how people could be allowed to bathe in such water.
"Considering the foamy outflow in the water, our demand is that pilgrims be prohibited from bathing at new ghats being built at Takali and Dasak. Lakhs are unaware of the situation and, in a sense, we will be affecting their health," said Rajesh Pandit, environmentalist. He has filed a PIL against the contamination in the high court. "The government has already ordered an inquiry into the quality of these new ghats. If this is the case, in addition to the issue of pollution, the poor quality work of ghats may endanger many lives during the bath," Pandit said.
NMC in charge of the plants, R K Pawar, said it was just detergent. "Water at Tapovan and other places is treated, and the foam is just a byproduct, only due to the detergent used to treat the sewage." He added, "The foam appears due to the velocity with which the treated water enters the river. If we were to remove the foam, the treating process would get very expensive."
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