Revitalization of Rivers in India Draft Policy - Isha Guru Jaggi Vasudev

Revitalization of Rivers In India
Draft Policy Recommendation
may be in suspended or dissolved form. Some of these components
are nutrients that are useful for plant growth, but cannot be used or
harnessed in their present form when they are mixed in wastewater.
Industrial effluents and domestic sewage contaminated by mixing with
such effluents can carry various other, often toxic, chemicals such as
pesticides, heavy metals, etc.
Many of the chemicals in the above two categories are found to
disrupt endocrine systems in humans (and therefore, obviously in other
life forms), and are now categorized as “Endocrine Disrupters”. Many of
the chemicals also do not readily degrade over time and are categorized as
Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs).
Sand mining and riverbed dredging: River beds are the most
sensitive part of the riverine ecosystems. The bed is formed by the river
flowing on it for millennia. The river beds are today being disturbed either
to mine sand or to dredge and deepen the river floor for waterways. In the
recent floods that devastated Bihar, sand mining is observed to be one
of reasons that made the impact of the floods worse. 57 Sand was always
harvested from the rivers as a practice to meet construction needs. The
present scenario is problematic due to the unsustainable and unregulated
form of mining done on riverbeds.
SIXTH KNOT – CLIMATE CHANGE
Climate change is perhaps emerging as one of the greatest
environmental challenges of the twenty-first century, which is further
intensified due to population growth, economic development and increased
demand on natural resources for food and energy needs. As scientific
evidence and information on global warming emerges, the role of forests and
associated ecosystems assume greater relevance in this context.
In recent decades, the impacts of climate change have indicated
the sensitivity of natural and human systems towards it. Changing
precipitation patterns, changing seasons and changes in cropping
season, ocean acidification, migration of species due to fluctuations in
63