NGT team visits Ganga ghats, collect samples

Kanpur: A team of National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Thursday inspected several ghats of the Ganga and collected water samples to send them for testing and inspection report to NGT for action.
NGT was receiving complaints about discharges of nullahs in the river, encroachment and pollution in the river. One Deepak Kumar Awasthi had filed a petition before NGT on May 17, 2022 and had pleaded that nullahs were discharging pollutants in the river and banks of the river have been encroached by the houses and their discharge was polluting the river.
The NGT constituted a team and sent that for spot inspection. R K Pal environment Engineer as a representative of municipal commissioner Kanpur, Mohd Nazir additional city magistrate (first), Dr Shefali environment specialist and advisor of National Mission for clean Ganga ( NMCG) Dr Sitaram Taigor environment expert & State Swachh Ganga Mission and Amit Mishra regional manager UP Pollution control board were the members of this team. The team visited Rani ghat, Bari ghat, Tiwari Ghat, Rameshwar ghat, and observed that locals had encroached the banks at Bhairav ghat, Rani ghat, Sarsaiya ghat , Budhia ghat, Magazine ghat and they were discharging their domestic waste in the river. The team collected the water samples of the river from Rani ghat and Rameshwar ghat to check the quality of water. RK Pal, environmental engineer Kanpur Municipal corporation, talking to T O I stated that the NGT team had inspected several ghats of the river and observed encroachment on the banks and had collected the samples of water. The NMCG would prepare a report about spot inspection and submit the same before the NGT. The NGT has fixed August 17 ,2022 as the next date for hearing on the petition of Awasthi.