While the waters of Ganga and Yamuna in Haridwar and New Delhi have become much clearer, a similar sight was witnessed in Prayagraj city in Uttar Pradesh which is famous for its Sangam (union) of Ganga, Yamuna and Saraswati.
The water of Ganga and Yamuna in Prayagraj, too, has become much cleaner and purer during the ongoing lockdown –an unseen sight since several decades.
The readings of Ganga Pollution Control Board have supported the purity of these rivers. The UP pollution control board (UPPCB) gathered the first sample of these rivers during the lockdown on April 9 from both upstream and downstream locations of Ganga.
The good quality of Yamuna water can be identified by considering the fecal coliform which has been reduced to 310MPN from 1300MPN, during the lockdown. Prof B D Tripathi, former faculty member of Banaras Hindu University (BHU), told TOI that nature is regenerating itself, and even the river biodiversity is improving in the absence of industrial pollutants these days. He added that the government should impose lockdown every six months to allow the environment and river to replenish themselves.
Anil Prakash Joshi, Environmentalist and Padam Bhushan awardee, voiced his opinion on this development by saying that COVID-19 is just a medium of conveying how much harm has been done by humankind to the environment. Signalling at the fruitless activities taken by the government to clean the rivers, he said that what the government failed to do in 30 years, nature has done in merely 20 days.