Some important orders passed by the High Court The orders included the recent closure of many industries, namely 150 tanneries in Kanpur, 40 Saree printing units in Varanasi, 10 carpet dyeing units in Mirzapur etc. that did not have Primary Effluent Treatment Plants (PETP), 7 stone crushers at Hardwar, the formation of the river police in 22 towns of UP along river Ganga to ensure that no dead bodies and other pollutants are thrown into the river and prevent defecation on the banks, uninterrupted power supply to all assets like waste treatment plants, pumping stations, crematoria etc. created under Ganga Action Plan phase-I, cleaning of the Lower Ganga Canal System which is the raw water source for Kanpur (having capacity of 5.5 mld ), removal of 5000 truck-loads of chrome laden toxic tannery sludge from Jajmau area and to ensure its safe disposal, removal of illegal settlements on various ghats (river banks of Hardwar and Rishikesh towns). The court also ordered to form a Ganga Fund in order to promote public participation and contribution. In its past orders the court made Garhwal Mandal Vikas Nigam (GMVN) party to this case. The GMVN is the premier body for the development and tourism work in the Garhwal Himalaya. This order came following a newspaper report that Gangotri Glacier (source of the Ganga river) is shrinking fast and Ganga is polluted right from the source at Gaumukh. The court has also ordered the UP Pollution Control Board to do a monthly monitoring of river water quality from the users point of view unlike the previous method of sampling water from the centre of the river. Thus, an effort to improve the quality of water at bathing ghats and intake points has been undertaken to ensure the safety of the users and communities living along the banks and for all those directly or indirectly dependent on river water. The court has nominated a team of auditors with Sameer Gupta as leader (all senior Retd. Officers of Indian Audit & Accounts Services) to make an investigation as to how the money under the Ganga Action Plan Phase-I was spent. The audit team has already submitted its first report to the court. Hon’ble High Court vide its order dated: May 5-1998 had formed a High powered committee under the Chairmanship of Chief Secretary of the UP Govt. in order to ensure compliance of various orders passed by this court and on suggestions given by the petitioner from time to time. The high powered committee meets every fortnight in which 10 principal secretaries of various departments, Commissioners of various Divisions, District Magistrates of various towns and other top officials of UP Pollution Control Board, UP Jal Nigam, and representatives of Central Govt. participate. Eco-friends studies the report to verify the claims of the compliance report. We are also requesting the court to declare 200 metre of area on both sides of the banks as a No Development Zone and the same be transferred to the forest department for afforestation and the involvement of the affected communities for carrying out the afforestation. In fact. We are proposing that in the entire Ganga cleaning programme, wherever manual labour is required, the affected communities and displaced people should be accorded priority in providing employment. We are also requesting the court to direct the Govt to evolve some policy regarding urbanisation and industrialisation of Ganga. We want that no more virgin land of Ganga (Flood plain/ River bed) should be colonised for further urban sprawl or industrial use. We also want the court to issue the direction to the Govt. to form a Ganga Vahini (Task Force) involving those communities which are directly related with Ganga and are dependent on Ganga for their livelihood. Results obtained so far The intake point until a couple of months ago received five huge drains of waste water including one from a TB hospital. Following the court orders, the Govt. claims that all drains have now been tapped and diverted, yet it is felt that the tapping is not absolutely affected. However, there is a discernible reduction of effluent discharge over the past two months. The BOD has fallen to 4 mg/l from 9 mg/l (UP Pollution Control Board ). Eco-friends constant vigil and policing has ensured that no dead bodies are thrown into the river and people do not defecate on the banks and also throw the trash into the river. From the 100 dead bodies in the Ganga river of Kanpur stretch on any given day last year, the number has drastically fallen down to less than 10. This is a visible indicator of the success of Eco-friends. All industries of Kanpur, Banaras, Mirzapur and other towns that discharge polluting effluents and do not have PETP have been closed and are being reopened only after installation of PETP. Installation of PETP had been made mandatory by the Supreme Court in 1985 but the order was not complied with even after 13 years. However, as a result of this PIL, the defaulters have been brought to task. The UP State Electricity Board has been ordered to provide uninterrupted power supply to GAP assets. Efforts are being made to ensure uninterrupted power supply to all the assets of GAP. On an average, Kanpur city faces power cuts of 8 hours per day. With that almost one third of the sewage and effluents were being discharged untreated everyday in the river. Efforts are also being made to ensure safe disposal of toxic tannery sludge which was lying in the open, thus posing health hazard and also contaminating the ground water.
Posted on: Thu, 12 Jun 2014 04:06:55 +0000
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