Government comes up with a perfect solution to fight pollution
Words by: FWD Media Images: Various sources
As a perfect solution to save river Ganga and Yamuna from pollution, the High Court in the northern state of Uttarakhand declared the two rivers and their tributaries as living entities with full legal rights.
Hindus consider Ganga and Yamuna sacred and believe to have miraculous healing powers. The ruling by Judges Rajeev Sharma and Alok Singh gives the rivers human status, which means that if the rivers are harmed or polluted the source will have to face the same consequences as harming a person.
The court’s ruling comes just after New Zealand’s third largest river, Whanganui was declared as a living entity and two guardians have been appointed to protect its interests.
M.C Pant, a lawyer for the public interest litigation against the state for inaction in clearing encroachments on the banks of the Yamuna said that this ruling by the government will help protect the rivers, as they now have all the constitutional and statutory rights of human beings, including the right to life.
The case came after officials complained that the governments of Uttarakhand and neighboring state of Uttar Pradesh were not cooperating with federal government efforts to set up a panel to protect the Ganges. However, activist Vimlendu Jha, who has been fighting for more than a decade to clean up the Yamuna, the decision is not enough to save the river. The two rivers have to be conserved, or else we will have to face a huge ecological and health crisis in the future.”