THE story of Ganesh immersion in Nagpur has changed altogether. Lakes are being spared from the immersion. Instead, innumerable small tanks come up everywhere to accommodate small idols every year. The civic administration, the Police as well as countless voluntary organisations stand together to ensure that the lakes are not invaded by over-enthusiastic devotees to immerse their Ganesh idols into actual lake waters. This is, of course, the most welcome development. For, when the lakes are kept free from so much of extraneous stuff from getting into the waters, environs, too, remain cleanlier. However, the loosefooter has some serious questions to ask about the city’s lakes -- naturally against the background of the new trend of not allowing Ganesh immersion into the lakes: If we have become so conscious about keeping the lakes spared from ganesh immersion, then why do we not demonstrate a similar awareness about keeping the lakes in great shape ? Why are we allowing the lakes in the city of Nagpur to fall on bad days because of our general apathy?

 

Why do we not rise as one man and shift the residents who have made houses right at the lake-water’s edge in several places in the city ? Why do we not stop the politicians from messing up lakes with fountains etc when the lakes’ hydrologies cannot accommodate such activities ? Why have we allowed our three rivers -- the Naag, the Pili, the Pohra -- to become massive gutters ? Why have we not taken appropriate steps to undo the damage we have cause to our Lokmatas (this term is used for rivers in the country since time immemorial) in all these years ? (Yes, we do hear these days of some stray information about some efforts for the rejuvenation of the Naag river.) But why have we taken such long to start moving in that direction ?

 

The loosefooter asks these questions not because he enjoys negativism. He does so because he is conscious of the general apathy of the city towards its sacred waterbodies. He asks these questions with a lot of pain in his heart. As a journalist, all he can do is to raise issues and ask questions. But there is every reason to feel dejected and rejected when the city just refuses to move to protect its wonderful waterbodies. Everybody knows that the city had had a rich history of great waterbodies -- lakes and rivers. And everybody also now knows that the city has messed up its sources of water so systematically carved out of Nature by the city’s founders at least a couple of centuries ago. This is the sad story ! Can we not rewrite it for the better ? n