MEERUT: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has
directed the Uttar Pradesh State Pollution Control Board (UP- PCB) to identify
and install sewage treatment plants (STPs) at major sources of pollution in the
Kali river, a tributary of the Ganga, as a part of the latter’s clean up.
Following the direction, the UPPCB has identified 26 large sewage lines
in six districts of western U.P. which empty into the Ka
Inspection soon:
According to Atulesh Yadav a local officer with the UP-PCB,
“The NGT has asked the UPPCB and Jal Nigam to jointly work to prevent pollution
in the Kali river. It will be done as part of the Prime Minister’s Namami Gange
project. Twenty –six big sewage lines, which do not have STPs, have been
identified in Meerut, Muzaffarnagar, Ghaziabad, Hapur, Bulandshahr,Aligarh and
Kannauj. The process will soon start to inspect these sewage lines,” he said.
Kali river
originates from Antwada village of Khatauli block in Muzaffarnagar and joins
the Ganga in Kanpur after passing through Merrut, Hapur, Bulandshahr, Gaziabad,
Aligarh and Kannauj districts.
Acoording
to Raman Tyagi, whose petition in the NGT about pollution of the Kali river led
to the tribunal directive , over two decades ago, the Kali used to be a clean
river and its water was used for drinking by villagers living on its banks.
Mr. Tyagi has
been monitoring the pollution in the Kali, Krishna and Hindon and other
tributaries of the Ganga in western U.P.
Industrial
effluents:
“But industrial effluents from paper and sugar mills and
slaughter houses with unhealthy chemical wastes, besides untreated sewage over
the last two decades has made the river poisonous that no living organism is
found in the water.
“ It not only pollutes the Ganga but the
poisonous water has contaminated drinking water through the seepage in
thousands of villages located on its banks,” said Mr. Tyagi, founder of NEER
foundation which wors on the issue of water and renewable energy in western
U.P.
Seal
handpumps:
“Our investigation showed that water in villages has been
seriously polluted and is manifest in medical problems for villagers who
consume the drinking water from hand pumps. We requested that these hand pumps be sealed and the government arrange for clean
drinking water in those areas. We also prayed that the NGT should ensure
serious measures to prevent pollution of Kali, as it was a tributary of the
Ganga and its pollution becomes the pollution of Ganga,” he told The Hindu.
