Last month, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann drank a glass of water from the Kali Bein, a “holy river”, in order to show that it was clean. Two days later, he was hospitalised. This, believe it or not, was part of a campaign to show progress in cleaning water bodies. It illustrates, however, just how much work remains to be done in combating India’s water pollution.
Seventy per cent of the sewage that India generates is not treated. More than 4,000 septic trucks full of sludge are disposed of in the Ganges, its longest river, and its tributaries every day. Each truck would contain, on average, 5,000 litres of human waste. Perhaps what is more concerning is that the river basin has become the dumping ground for plastic garbage, including micro-plastics from face masks used during the pandemic.
According to ‘The Impact of Covid-19 on Plastic Waste Management in South Asia‘ by the World Bank, “The Indus and Ganges are among the world’s ten most polluted river systems in that they carry 90% of the plastic waste into the ocean.”
Water pollution in India is widespread
The Sri Lanka-based International Water Management Institute also states that India is a water stress zone, where 33% of its rivers are moderately or severely polluted.
Water pollution has infiltrated India’s state of Maharashtra, where a 2021 study conducted by ASAR Social Impact Advisors, a Bangalore-based consultancy, and two local research centres, the Center for Sustainable Development in Nagpur and Manthan Adhyayan Kendra in Pune, found toxic metals, such as mercury and arsenic, in surface and groundwater in 25 locations around fast-growing Nagpur.
High levels of fluoride, which cause teeth discolouration and potentially other health concerns, have already been reported in the groundwater of Amravati-Nagpur and the coastal South Konkan, where 93% of the residents depend on it for daily consumption. The researchers stated that their focus is different from others – on the water contamination at the power plants and not on the much-studied effects on air, like at Koradi and Khaparkheda.
The culprit seems to be coal combustion, which is used to produce 70% of the country’s electricity. It creates fly ash, which is typically kept in ash ponds that, due to their constructed dikes, sometimes spill into surrounding farms, fields and bodies of water. In Nagpur, this water is used by the locals for “drinking (with or without treatment)… domestic use, bathing, washing clothes, fishing, irrigation, and water for cattle”, according to the report, ‘Polluted Power: How Koradi And Khaperkheda Thermal Power Stations Are Impacting the Environment.