The river Ganga (Ganges) occupies a unique position in the

cultural segment of India.

Legend says that the river has descended from Heaven on earth as a
result of the long and arduous prayers of King Bhagirathi for the
salvation of his deceased ancestors.
From times immemorial, the Ganga has been India's river of faith,
devotion and worship. Millions of Hindus accept its water as
sacred. Hindu Religion involves ceremonial use of this holy water
Even today, people carry treasured Ganga water all over India and
abroad because it is holy water and known for its "curative
(medicine or therapy) properties.

However, the river is not just a legend, it is also a life-support system

for the people of India and hence treated as GANGA MATA (goddess)
by Hindus.

The Ganga (Ganges) basin extends over more than 1 million km2 and
encompasses parts of India (about 80% of the total basin area), Nepal, China and
Bangladesh.

The length of the main channel is some 2,525km, while altitude ranges from
8,848m in the high Himalayas, to sea level in the coastal deltas of India and
Bangladesh. The basin occupies a quarter of Indias land mass.

Flow pattern is for a low-flow dry season from January to May and a wet season
from July to November, with peak flows usually occurring in August.

The waters of the Ganga carry one of the highest sediment loads anywhere in the
world, with a mean annual total of 1.6 billion tonnes, compared to 0.4 billion
tonnes for the Amazon.

The most sacred and the basic ritual in Hinduism is taking the bath
in the holy water of river Ganga . As it is compulsory for every
Hindu to take a dip in Ganges once in a life time, many devotees
travel to these ghats to wash away their sins in the holy water of
Ganga.

Recently, Kumbh Mela (largest religious gathering on the planet) in

2010 at Haridwar witnessed around 80 million devotees travelling
from different parts of India to take a holy dip in Ganga.

There are many auspicious days like Baisakhi, Amavasyas on

which mass bathing takes place in Ganga. The main holy sites are
Allahabad, Mathura, Haridwar and Varanasi.

Haridwar's Kumbh Mela is known as "The Largest

Pilgrimage on Earth". Calling it "one of the most
extraordinary displays of faith on Earth, a spectacular
journey drawing tens of millions of people".

Water quality is severely affected by mass bathing.

Deterioration of river water quality may injure health
of the people taking the dip and also the population
downstream which use the river as a source of water
for drinking and bathing

There is a famous bollywood song highlighting this

fact in context of the film :

The annual ritual of immersing idols of Goddess

Durga and other Hindu deities in the Ganga river
has threaten the survival of the endangered river
dolphin and other aquatic creatures but also
increases pollution in the already polluted river.
Thousands of idols are immersed in the Ganga in
Kolkata, Patna and other cites situated on the
banks of river last year to mark the end of the
Durga Puja festival.

Aartis are performed everyday on various ghats of

Ganga, after which religious items are left to flow in
Ganges.

Hindus dump their religious household wastes in

Ganga and Yamuna.

Some of them gets handpicked by local people at

ghats.

But still polythenes, plastics and many other harmful

items associated, degrades and pollutes the Ganga
river.

The river is the final resting place for thousands of Hindus, whose
cremated ashes or partially burnt corpses are placed in the river
for spiritual rebirth.

In Varanasi, Maha samashanam' (or 'Great cremation ground'),

some 40,000 cremations are performed each year, most on wood
pyres that do not completely consume the body.

Along with the remains of these traditional funerals, there are

thousands more who cannot afford cremation and whose bodies
are simply thrown into the Ganga.

In addition, the carcasses of thousands of dead cattle, which are

sacred to Hindus, go into the river each year.

The Ganga has been described by the World Wildlife Fund as one of the
worlds top ten rivers at risk.

It has over 140 fish species, 90 amphibian species, and five areas which
support birds found nowhere else in the world.

In a recent finding, the scientists have observed that various species of

fishes which helped in keeping the river water clean are facing extinction.

Gangetic dolphins (declared as national Aquatic Animal) were once

found in abundance in the river Ganges. But over the years a steady
increase in pollution in the river has decreased the population of
Dolphins.

According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Gangetic dolphins are in

grave danger with their population declining at a rate of 10 percent
annually. Rotten Dead Bodies are one of the major cause behind it.

M Omair from the University of Michigan in the US has

collected zooplankton samples from Haridwar, Kanpur,
Allahabad, Varanasi, Patna, and Kolkata.

He found that many of the zooplanktons that are eaten by

the small fish have tumours.

The small fish are in turn eaten by the bigger fish and so
on, so the ill zooplanktons are getting into the entire food
chain, including humans who eat fish from the river.

"It is a bad sign for the environmental health of the

Ganga," Omair said.

Ganga River supports many Plant Species which are of

both ecological and economic importance.

Due to contamination and pollution of Ganga river, many

of these species are getting extinct.

They play an important role in nutrient and water

conversion and preventing soil erosion.

Ganga is said to be of curative nature because of

medicinal and therapeutic values attached to it.

There is a decline in its medicinal values over the years

because of lack of support to herbal and medicinal plants.