Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious Clean Ganga’ programme to ensure conservation, cleanliness of river Ganga will take off today with the launch of 231 projects. Uma Bharti, the Union Minister of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation announced that the projects will be launched at various locations in Uttrakhand, UP, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Haryana and Delhi. The main function will be held at Haridwar which will be attended by Uttrakhand CM Harish Rawat and Union Ministers Nitin Gadkari, Choudhary Birender Singh, Mahesh Sharma and Uma Bharti. 1) These projects involve modernization and redevelopment of ghats and crematoriums, development of sewage infrastructure and treatment, afforestation, tree plantation (medicinal plants), pilot drain project, interceptor drain project, trash skimmers and conservation of biodiversity. 2) 400 villages along the river Ganga will be developed as Ganga Gram in phase-I. 3) 13 IITs have adopted five villages each for development as Ganga Grams. Training for 328 sarpanchs was completed at Sichawal in Punjab. 4) Eight biodiversity centers will be developed along Ganga for restoration of priority species. These centers will be developed at Rishikesh, Narora, Dehradun, Allahabad, Bhagalpur, Varanasi, Sahibganj and Barraackpore. 5) The government will also launch an application to monitor level of pollution in the river. Future plans: Earlier this week, Bharti said that a new act will be formulated for speedy implementation of the Namami Gange programme. Five Ganga basin states have in-principle agreed to this. With regards to river front development, 1242 ghats and drains in 411 villages have been identified and work is expected to start soon. Out of 118 towns along the river Ganga, detailed survey of 59 towns has been completed and 27 reports have been prepared. 50 more reports will be received by this month end. Wild Life Institute of India has been selected to suggest majors for conservation of dolphins, crocodiles and other species. Additionally, Central Inlands Fisheries Research Institute has been asked to undertake various majors for the conservation of various types of fish. Trees will be planted in 2700 hectare areas along the river Ganga during the current financial year. 57 manual and five real time monitoring stations have already started functioning to monitor the quality of water of river Ganga. In addition to this 113 more real time stations will be set up by March next year.
2016 The Indian Express [P] Ltd.