With the Bengal elections won, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on last Monday said that the lotus is now “blooming from Gangotri to Gangasagar” while addressing the BJP workers at the party headquarters in Delhi after the results.
Modi had earlier found the “soul of Bengal” in Ganga during his country boat ride in the river on April 24 on the sidelines of his electoral campaign in the state. His repeated references to Ganga have made environmentalists hopeful that the incoming BLP government would prioritise the issue of Ganga pollution in the state.
The part of the Ganga where the Prime Minister went for a boat ride is one of the most polluted in the country and is “not fit for bathing”.
Rajendra Singh, the waterman of India, is critical of the Union government’s role in saving the Ganga. “The government is not bothered about the river’s ecological and environmental flow,” Singh earlier told The Plurals.
No action on ground, activists claimed
“The Prime Minister has mentioned Ganga in the context of the Bengal elections twice within 10 days. I expect his thoughts on Ganga will translate from the realm of campaigns to the reality of action by the BJP government in the state,” said an environmentalist, not wanting to be named.
Others are not as hopeful. “I have been following the agenda since 1985. While Rajiv Gandhi was keen and initiated the Ganga Action Plan, none of the following ruling parties and Prime Ministers were interested in the issue,” said environment activist Subhas Datta, who had earlier moved several times to court on Ganga pollution.
Biswajit Mukherjee, former chief law officer of the state pollution control board, pointed out that although several high-power committees were set up from time to time — from Ganga Action Plan (GAP) to National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) to National Ganga Council (NGC) —and a huge amount of money was spent, they did not lead to improvement in river water quality. “Over the years, combating Ganga pollution has been a combination of administrative failures and financial scams,” Mukherjee alleged.
Money flowed in the wrong direction
Experts pointed out that the Union government could have been more committed to contain the national river’s pollution and reminded that Modi last chaired a National Ganga Council (NGC) meeting in 2022. The NGC was constituted in October 2016, replacing the earlier National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA).
It is also claimed that a major part of the 492 pollution abatement projects sanctioned till early 2025, costing over Rs 40000 crore, have been about riverfront development and not about containing the pollution levels directly.
Improvement claim under scanner
A Union government report, published on December 4, 2025, and accessed by The Plurals, shows that the part of the river from Baharampur to Diamond Harbour, within Bengal, continued to be a significant “polluted stretch” despite the overall pollution status of Ganga improving within Bengal compared to the situation in 2018.
“The trick lies in the fact that the government of India only considers ‘dissolved oxygen (DO)’ and ‘biochemical oxygen demand (BOD)’ while describing the pollution status of a river and excludes the non-point pollution as well as coliforms; otherwise, the status would have been much worse,” admitted a senior official of the state environment department to this correspondent. The Union government report stated that “total sewerage generated in the 5 Ganga states is about 10,160 MLD (million litres daily) against which the available STP (sewage treatment plant) capacity is 7820 MLD,” meaning almost 23% of the wastewater is going into the river untreated.
Data vindicates high coliform pollution
The West Bengal Pollution Control Board’s latest figures show that the level of coliform bacteria in all 14 sampled points in Ganga flowing through West Bengal are presently much above the permissible limit of 50 per 100 ml. The figures show that the river water in Garden Reach near Kolkata is the most polluted, with 94000 coliform bacteria per 100 ml, followed by the stretches in Howrah-Sibpur, Dakhineswar and Sreerampore with 79000, 70000, and 70000, respectively. “The best water quality was found near Diamond Harbour with a coliform value of 1700, still 34 times above the permissible limit,” pointed out a river expert.
Independent scientific studies corroborate the findings. A scientific publication published by a few researchers at Visva Bharati University in 2025 reads, “…the rainy season was more polluted with heavy increase in both TC (total coliform) and FC (faecal coliform), leading to a drastic fall in DO. The BOD was alarmingly high in winter.”
Ganga on Modi’s lips, experts want it to be a priority for incoming Bengal government
The river stretch, where the Prime Minister rafted in a country boat, has 1600 times more bacterial pollution compared to the national limit
With the Bengal elections won, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on last Monday said that the lotus is now “blooming from Gangotri to Gangasagar” while addressing the BJP workers at the party headquarters in Delhi after the results.
Modi had earlier found the “soul of Bengal” in Ganga during his country boat ride in the river on April 24 on the sidelines of his electoral campaign in the state. His repeated references to Ganga have made environmentalists hopeful that the incoming BLP government would prioritise the issue of Ganga pollution in the state.
The part of the Ganga where the Prime Minister went for a boat ride is one of the most polluted in the country and is “not fit for bathing”.
Rajendra Singh, the waterman of India, is critical of the Union government’s role in saving the Ganga. “The government is not bothered about the river’s ecological and environmental flow,” Singh earlier told The Plurals.
No action on ground, activists claimed
“The Prime Minister has mentioned Ganga in the context of the Bengal elections twice within 10 days. I expect his thoughts on Ganga will translate from the realm of campaigns to the reality of action by the BJP government in the state,” said an environmentalist, not wanting to be named.
Others are not as hopeful. “I have been following the agenda since 1985. While Rajiv Gandhi was keen and initiated the Ganga Action Plan, none of the following ruling parties and Prime Ministers were interested in the issue,” said environment activist Subhas Datta, who had earlier moved several times to court on Ganga pollution.
Biswajit Mukherjee, former chief law officer of the state pollution control board, pointed out that although several high-power committees were set up from time to time — from Ganga Action Plan (GAP) to National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) to National Ganga Council (NGC) —and a huge amount of money was spent, they did not lead to improvement in river water quality. “Over the years, combating Ganga pollution has been a combination of administrative failures and financial scams,” Mukherjee alleged.
Money flowed in the wrong direction
Experts pointed out that the Union government could have been more committed to contain the national river’s pollution and reminded that Modi last chaired a National Ganga Council (NGC) meeting in 2022. The NGC was constituted in October 2016, replacing the earlier National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA).
It is also claimed that a major part of the 492 pollution abatement projects sanctioned till early 2025, costing over Rs 40000 crore, have been about riverfront development and not about containing the pollution levels directly.
Improvement claim under scanner
A Union government report, published on December 4, 2025, and accessed by The Plurals, shows that the part of the river from Baharampur to Diamond Harbour, within Bengal, continued to be a significant “polluted stretch” despite the overall pollution status of Ganga improving within Bengal compared to the situation in 2018.
“The trick lies in the fact that the government of India only considers ‘dissolved oxygen (DO)’ and ‘biochemical oxygen demand (BOD)’ while describing the pollution status of a river and excludes the non-point pollution as well as coliforms; otherwise, the status would have been much worse,” admitted a senior official of the state environment department to this correspondent. The Union government report stated that “total sewerage generated in the 5 Ganga states is about 10,160 MLD (million litres daily) against which the available STP (sewage treatment plant) capacity is 7820 MLD,” meaning almost 23% of the wastewater is going into the river untreated.
Data vindicates high coliform pollution
The West Bengal Pollution Control Board’s latest figures show that the level of coliform bacteria in all 14 sampled points in Ganga flowing through West Bengal are presently much above the permissible limit of 50 per 100 ml. The figures show that the river water in Garden Reach near Kolkata is the most polluted, with 94000 coliform bacteria per 100 ml, followed by the stretches in Howrah-Sibpur, Dakhineswar and Sreerampore with 79000, 70000, and 70000, respectively. “The best water quality was found near Diamond Harbour with a coliform value of 1700, still 34 times above the permissible limit,” pointed out a river expert.
Independent scientific studies corroborate the findings. A scientific publication published by a few researchers at Visva Bharati University in 2025 reads, “…the rainy season was more polluted with heavy increase in both TC (total coliform) and FC (faecal coliform), leading to a drastic fall in DO. The BOD was alarmingly high in winter.”
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