How clean are our rivers? Latest data indicates a negative trend.  A report by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), which was released in September this year, reveals that in total there were 45 river stretches across the country in 2016-17, where water quality is found to be the worst. In 2014-15, however, the total number of such river stretches was just 34. Technically speaking, the value of biochemical oxygen demand...

-Frontline.in Four years after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement of the Namami Gange project, the river remains as dirty as ever. WHILE in Varanasi to file his nomination papers for the 2014 Lok Sabha election, Narendra Modi, then the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) prime ministerial nominee, had declared with his characteristic bravado, “I have not come here on my own. I have been invited by mother Ganga.” He said it was his...

-The Hindu The court-ordered clean-up in the textile town has managed to mitigate ill-effects of industrial pollution to a large extent. A similar remediation effort, involving the government and stakeholders, is needed in other parts of Tamil Nadu, where groundwater has been so contaminated that farming is not possible anymore On a sunny June morning, two men are spotted fishing close to the Orathupalayam dam in Erode district. A rather ordinary act in...

-The Hindu What Dhrubajyoti Ghosh closely observed and learnt from Kolkata’s wetland communities If ever there was someone who lived true to his name, it was Dhrubajyoti Ghosh. In Sanskrit, “Dhrubajyoti” refers to the light (jyoti) emitted by the pole star (dhruva tara). The ecologist, who passed away in February, was unwavering in his commitment to the cause he lived for and fearlessly defended: saving the ecologically critical East Kolkata Wetlands from...

-The Hindu Business Line Abuse of antibiotics, poor waste management main reasons: CSE study New Delhi: The unfettered use of antibiotics to keep chicks healthy in poultry farms has led to a proliferation in bacteria, which are resistant to the best of drugs used for fighting infections, according to a new study. An analysis carried out by the New Delhi-based NGO, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), said the soil in and around...