BHUBANESWAR: Taking advantage of the lack of proper enforcement in checking river pollution during festivals, several households and small puja organisers on Sunday skipped the temporary pond and immersed Lord Ganesh idols directly into the Kuakhai river.
Acting on the directive of the Odisha State Pollution Control Board (OSPCB), the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) created three temporary ponds at different places including on the banks of Kuakhai and Daya rivers for immersion of idols after Ganesh Puja celebrations. However, many people were seen immersing the idols directly into the river from atop Kuakhai bridge on the day.
They were also seen dumping flowers and other materials used in puja into the river in large quantities. Though BMC and police officials were present near the temporary pond on the bank of Kuakhai river, lack of deployment of any enforcement squad members gave people a free hand to park their vehicles on the bridge and immerse the idols into the river.
Raising concern on the issue, Swayam Jena, a student from Hanspal area called for sensitising people on the matter. “There will be more immersions in the coming days as the festival is being celebrated in hundreds of places across the city. People need to be sensitised and sign boards displayed prominently at different places for use of temporary ponds to check idol immersion in the rivers,” he added.
Locals also suggested that the civic body should mobilise enforcement teams near the bridge to guide people to go to the temporary pond for immersion.
As it is, water quality of both Kuakhai and Daya rivers has often being found to be poor on parameters such as dissolved oxygen, the biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and total coliform (TC). Keeping this in view, the OSPCB had also asked the authorities concerned in the past to ensure the leftover materials from the immersion sites are removed for their safe disposal at designated municipal dumping sites within 24 hours.