PUCL opposes Cauvery Aarti proposed by State Government
Mysore
People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Mysore, has strongly criticized the State Government’s proposal to organize a Cauvery Aarti along with Mysore Dasara estimated to cost the public exchequer a sum of Rs.100 Crore and against the recommendations of the Department of Finance.
In a press release on Wednesday, Kamal Gopinath, President and V.Purushottam, general secretary of PUCL, Mysore district unit said the traditional ‘Baagina’ offered to the River whenever KRS fills to brim and the Threethotbava rites at Thalcauvery are enough religious offerings to the river.
Instead of the proposed Cauvery Aarathi, the State Government must spend the amount and take further and more concrete initiatives at preventing pollution of the River Cauvery, from the chemicals from fertilizers flowing into the River from the Coffee and other estates of Kodagu and the different agricultural and industrial pollutants and effluents flowing into it all along its route through Mysore and onward.
They said the State Government should also focus on the restoration of natural rainwater flows into the river all along its route, by curbing the unabated real estate developments which are cutting off and impinging on such flows.
This apart, the pollution and wasting of its tributary, Lakshmanthreetha, owing to the affluents from the tobacco industry of Hunsur and surrounding regions is a long pending matter of concern which the State Government appears to be completely unmindful about.
The state Government should also lend its focus and finances to restoring the various lakes and other water bodies in the Cauvery basin. “These are under tremendous threat from the real estate lobby and the Water Resources Minister should ensure that the villages, towns and cities do not become another Bangalore, where lake beds have been usurped for various urban projects, leaving the City completely unmanageable, and very shortly unlivable, on the brink of collapse”, says Kamal Gopinath.
