WE THE PEOPLE
Pumping pollutants into River Jhelum, Kut Khul, Sunri Khul and other channels remain unchecked
Hence people urge Officials of State Pollution Control Board to enforce guidelines to save Water Bodies in Kashmir
By: M. Shirjeel
Srinagar: All water bodies are Natural gifts and it is the responsibility of humans to preserve and protect them at all costs. Once we trespass into the domain of Nature, the equilibrium tilts and negative effects start surfacing. This aspect has been totally neglected and ignored by some unscrupulous elements in Kashmir. Even government officials have gone along the current and the result being gradual decay of water-bodies in the Valley. This degradation has affected climatic conditions, which are being witnessed by us for the last four decades. We have a sole drainage channel in the form of river Jhelum, which divides the city of Srinagar into two halves. The ancient city is located on either banks of the river and is a standing monument, which acts as a strong link between the past and the present. In olden days, people had high moral and religious values and were refraining from taking any step, which would add pollution to water-bodies in general and the river Jhelum in particular. Even Kashmiri Pandits would worship the river and offer flower- petals to it during wee hours in good olden days.
But with the passage of time, the greed has overwhelmingly overtaken some unscrupulous elements, who started resorting to mass encroachments on water-bodies, particularly the banks of river Jhelum. Even mosques and temples were constructed on its banks and started discharging their raw sewage and other pollutants into the river. The State functionaries too started pumping raw sewage and drainage into the river and its allied channels. They ought to have designed proper sewage treatment plants and then taken recourse to discharging the effluents into the water-bodies. Throwing muck and pollutants by civilians is not so serious as that of Engineers discharging and pumping pollutants into water-bodies, particularly the river Jhelum. The UEED constructed several permanent and temporary dewatering stations in the city of Srinagar, but their disposal area is no other place than the river Jhedlum. This is a criminal act and quite unpardonable. The WHO has fixed norms for dilution ratio, which has to be maintained at all costs, but such a yardstick has no meaning with our State officials. Even the State Pollution Control Board has laid down certain guidelines for the preservation and protection of water-bodies, but their implementation is nowhere visible at the ground level. Had such directions been followed and implemented, the condition of our water-bodies would not be so pathetic today.
" Our ancestors had high religious values and had the knowledge and understanding of Nature's gifts bestowed upon human beings. They would take no such step, which would lead, to the pollution of rare gifts of Nature. But with the passage of time, we have turned more and more materialistic in our approach towards forests, glaciers, water-bodies and lush-green landscapes. In the process, we have not gained anything, but lost much, which is not commonly understood by every individual. We had box type latrines in our houses prior to the conception of water carriage system and vegetable-growers would visit each and every house in the city of Srinagar to clean their latrines every morning and use the night-soil as manure in their vegetable yards. No one would dare to discharge sewage or any other pollutant into the running rivers or nallahs. They would consider it as a big crime and hence there was no need for any departmental agency to intervene. Today, we have a full-fledged Pollution Control Board, which is charged with the responsibility of protecting and preserving all water bodies in Jammu and Kashmir. It seems its officials have either gone into hibernation or entered into a deep nexus with the violators of laid down guidelines", said a group of elderly persons of Kashmir Valley.
Hence, it is high time that officials of State Pollution Control Board rise to the occasion and enforce the laid down guidelines to protect and preserve water-bodies for our posterity. We must not pass on polluted water bodies to our future generations, as, otherwise, they will curse us. Let us take a pledge to save our water-bodies against all invasions, which will precipitate their degradation.
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