Hope Pinned on Swachh Bharat for Clean Mahanadi

The New Indian Express , Monday, June 08, 2015
Correspondent :
CUTTACK: People living in cities along major rivers in the country including Cuttack have pinned high hopes on Swachh Bharat Abhiyan to get rid of pollution woes.

Nearly 90 per cent of people in Cuttack perceive campaign as a powerful measure to bring about changes in river quality in terms of water quality, hygiene and environment that directly impacted the life in the city. The optimism over SwachhBaharat has been reflected across other cities like Dibrugarh, Jabalpur, Surat, Delhi, Varanasi and Vijayawada with 90 per cent, 85 per cent, 81 per cent, 75 per cent, 67 and 62 per cent of citizens respectively giving it a thumbs up.

The findings are part of Environmental Survey-2015 conducted by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) to gauge the perception, opinion and behaviour of people towards environment in Indian cities. The survey covered seven river-cities - Delhi on river Yamuna, Cuttack on Mahanadi, Dibrugarh on Brahmaputra, Jabalpur on Narmada, Surat on Tapti, Varanasi on Ganga and Vijayawada on Krishna river. The survey focused on overall environment, health and environment and river environment.

In Cuttack, more than 75 per cent of people surveyed felt that the quality of all environment indicators from air, surface water quality and availability, green cover, flora and fauna has worsened in recent years. Over half felt that water quality in Mahanadi has suffered seriously due to pollution caused by increasing human activity.

Launching the findings, acting Director-General, TERI, Leena Srivastava said, “People’s perceptions may or may not reflect reality but they do reflect their confidence levels in governments, their engagement with common cause issues and their daily fears.”

Almost the entire population in the Millennium City is aware of the pollution and threat caused by releasing untreated sewage into the river. More than 85 per cent have also attributed deteriorating river condition to an increase in dumping of industrial waste and effluents in the last one year.

Ninety per cent of people were knowledgeable of the health hazards posed by river pollution in terms of spread of waterborne diseases. Climate change was also having a visible impact on the river not only giving rise to extreme events like flood, drought and rainfall but also affecting the health of people residing by the river.

The denizens have stressed regular cleaning, proper treatment of sewerage, curbing illegal dumping of waste, effluents along with proper enforcement and monitoring by agencies concerned like Cuttack Municipal Corporation as key to improving the river quality.

TERI fellow Shri Prakash said, “The report clearly brings out the deep concern of people for saving environment irrespective of age, income level and educational standards.”

 
SOURCE : http://www.newindianexpress.com/states/odisha/Hope-Pinned-on-Swachh-Bharat-for-Clean-Mahanadi/2015/06/08/article2855097.ece
 


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