The Ganga river has moved away from the ghats of Varanasi, creating panic among devotees in the holy city.
The river, which is apparently changing its course, has moved about 7-10 feet away from the ghats. At the famous
Dasaswamegh Ghat, close to the Kashi Vishwanath temple, the river is flowing nine feet away from the ghat steps while at Rajendra Prasad Ghat, Rajghat and Assi Ghat it is seven, four and five feet away respectively from the ghats’ steps.
“The water level in the river has also gone down by about six feet; this is the first time the Ganga has abandoned the ghats. People now have to go midstream in a boat for a holy dip: this does not augur well for the city and its people. Even the Ganga aarti has lost its sheen without the river,” says Pandit Hargovind Tripathi, a religious preacher.
According to mythology, Goddess Ganga had promised Lord Shiva she would never leave the ghats of Kashi; hence the moving away of the river has created panic in the city.
Kirtans and special pujas are being held in various temples to bring the Ganga back to the ghats, and people are observing fasts as penance.
“We are responsible for polluting the Ganga and forcing the river to move away. The local administration has not worked to clean the river, and more and more pollutants are being pushed into the river. If this is not checked, the day is not far when the Ganga will restrict herself to her abode in the Himalayas and we will die of thirst,” says Acharya Jitendra of the Ganga Mahasabha.
Scientists associated with the Ganga Action Plan, on the other hand, also agree the river is changing course due to massive pollution and lack of proper cleaning of the river banks. The dams and barrages built upstream are diverting increasing amounts of water for farming and other purposes, and around nine per cent of the Ganga’s waters are diverted to canals at the Bhimgouda barrage alone,” says a scientist.
A government report says it has spent `36,448 crores to clean the Ganga, yet at Varanasi it has become a deadly cocktail of groundwater, sewage discharge and spillage from tributaries like the Yamuna and the Betwa.