Dr. Arvind Kumar
Season for religious festivities has set in and this phenomenon is an annual feature which is celebrated with great devotion and enthusiasm by the devotees by preparing idols of their chosen deities and holding processions. The festivals of Ganesh Chathurthi and Durga Puja are of specific significance because their celebrations entail preparing of idols of Ganeshji or Ganapati Bappa during Ganesh Chathurthi and the idol of Goddess Kali is prepared and decorated beautifully during the Durga Puja.
The idols of the deities are prepared from the clean and pure earthly soil and thereafter these idols are beautifully decorated with different colours. There takes place a sort of competition among different groups to prepare the most attractive idol of their deity. The colours used in beautifying the idols of the deities contain harmful chemical ingredients.
Once the celebrations are over, these idols are immersed in the nearby water bodies like rivers, lakes or in the sea.
Immersion of idols in the water bodies takes place every year in various parts of the country, particularly in Maharashtra and West Bengal. There are no statistics available as to how many idols of the deities are immersed in water bodies annually but broadly speaking this number goes into thousands.
After the immersion takes place, the soil settles down but the colours get mingled with water thereby the water gets polluted with chemical ingredients of those colours. The consumption of that polluted water by the fish or other water animals results in their death and the dead bodies of fish or other animals further contributes to pollution, if those dead bodies are not removed in time.
Our national rivers like Ganga, Yamuna, Kaveri, Krishna and others are already reported to be highly polluted. Thus this ritual of immersing of the idols of the sacred deities further contributes to pollution. We therefore appeal to the religious bodies, mandals and other concerned bodies associated with these celebrations to use natural colours for beautifying the idols of the deities and avoid immersion of the idols in the rivers, lakes or in the sea. Instead some other arrangements like temporary water ponds can be dug in the cities where these celebrations take place for immersing the idols. We also appeal to the Central Government as well as concerned State Governments and local civic authorities to help such religious bodies locate appropriate sites for idol immersion. Pollution is a national as well as international problem and it can be controlled not by government alone but requires the active cooperation of the public at large. Thus celebrate religious festivities with added gusto and perform the sacred duty of keeping the environment free from pollution simultaneously.
