The ballad of a river in run-up to Kumbh mela

The Godavari's woes have come to the fore through the 'Godavari Parikrma' and a petition filed with the National Green Tribunal even as the polity and bureaucracy are taking time to shed the inertia and initiate arrangements to host the next Kumbh mela in July next year at Trimbakeshwar and Ramkund on the river.
The Parikrama, led by Magsaysay Awardee water expert Rajendra Singh, began on Sunday at Trimbakeshwar, where the Godavari originates in the Brahmagiri hills.It reached Ramkund in Nashik city, nearly 30 km downstream, with Singh making an earnest appeal against mixing of sewer with the river. Besides, concern was raised over concretisation that would interfere with the river's natural flow.
There has been an outcry in Trimbakeshwar by some citizens and environmental groups about the river being ravaged by local authorities. At various places in Trimbakeshwar, the local municipal council has replaced pipes with concrete slabs. For instance, from Kushavart to the main temple, the concretisation has been carried out to facilitate the local marketplace. Kushavart is the place where pilgrims from Shaiva sect perform rituals.
Besides, dumping of used prayer material in the river continues unabated, turning the river into a nullah. Since Trimbakeshwar has a special significance for the pious as rituals like 'Narayan Nagbali' (in which a cobra made of gold is given as dakshina to a Brahmin) are performed, a large quantity of nirmalya (used/discarded prayer material) is generated and dumped into the river.
Downstream, as the river approaches Nashik city over a distance of 30 km, it gets contaminated with not only drainage and industrial effluents, but also with untreated sewage released by the Nashik Municipal Corporation (NMC). The NMC has not been able to treat the entire sewage generated in the city and continues to be one of the major pollutants of the river, despite being primarily responsible to keep it clean.
At Ramkund in Godavari in Panchavati,Nashik city, which is the place where pilgrims from the Vaishnav sect take the holy dip and carry the river water as 'holy water' back home, the water is so contaminated that after an NGO - the Godavari Gatarikaran Virodhi Manch - moved a public interest litigation (PIL), the high court ordered the NMC to display warning boards on the river banks on the water being polluted.
Because of the release of sewage in the river, there is proliferation of water hyacinth that breeds on the micronutrients in the sewage. The hyacinth, at times, covers the entire river, for better part of the year. To make matters worse, the river is further ravaged by local citizens, who wash utensils, clothes and vehicles, apart from dumping garbage downstream of Ramkund.
The NMC has initiated the creation of a new sewage treatment plant at Gangapur, upstream of Ramkund, to prevent the release of sewage into the river. However, the project has hit a snag, with the NMC not being able to acquire land for the sewage pumping station. The matter is under litigation with the landholders moving the court. Incidentally, the previous municipal commissioner, B D Sanap, had been unceremoniously transferred for recommending TDR for the landholders in the same project, despite a clear directive to the contrary, by the urban development department.
On Thursday, the National Green Tribunal sought a report from government agencies on the environmental impact of the concretisation of the river banks or river bed at Trimbakeshwar.
The Godavari Parikrama, meanwhile, will continue to travel along the river till Rajmundry in Andhra Pradesh, where it meets the sea. The Parikrama and the directives from the tribunal have once again brought to the fore the pitiable condition of one of the most important rivers of the county.
The NMC, which manages the affairs of Nashik that gets its identity from Godavari, has failed to fulfil one of its primary duties of keeping the river clean. In the run-up to the next Kumbh, when millions of pilgrims and Sadhus are expected to converge for the Kumbh rituals, the NMC is expected to take corrective measures soon as time is fleeting.