Ghaggar

Monitoring guidelines for sand mining released
Policy matters this week Posted on 29 Jan, 2020 11:39 PM

Guidelines to monitor illegal sand mining released

For the first time, the Environment Ministry has released Enforcement and Monitoring Guidelines for Sand Mining 2020 to monitor and check illegal sand mining in the country.

Illegal sand mining continues in the country unabated (Source: IWP Flickr photos)
Industrial waste discharge needs monitoring: NGT
Policy matters this week Posted on 19 Sep, 2018 02:40 PM

NGT asks CPCB to monitor industrial waste discharge of states

A creek near a thermal power plant. (Source: IWP Flickr photos)
River turns drain, drowns villages in sorrow
Despite repeated protests by villagers living around the Ghaggar, the river remains polluted, thanks to the apathy of the authorities. Posted on 18 Jan, 2018 04:08 PM

Till four decades ago, Ghaggar river in Haryana and Punjab was the lifeline of the villages along its course. Incessant dumping of sewage and industrial effluents, however, has choked the life out of it and has reduced it to a drain or nullah, as locals call it, now.

Rorki villagers show the effluent being released to the river. (Source: 101Reporters)
Climate change: When past presents itself
A new study pins climate change as one of the reasons for the decline of Indus Valley Civilisation Posted on 24 Jun, 2016 08:40 PM

Summers get hotter, rains decline and crops fail. The conflict between people increase and migration in search of better lands and skies begin. Sounds familiar? We are not talking about Marathwada here. This is how the lives of our ancestors played out thousands of years ago.

A narrow lane flanked by houses at Bhirrana. Source: Archaeological Survey of India
Ponds--once a lifeline of India's agriculture--are being revived by some Punjab farmers
Farm ponds, rediscovered by a few farmers in Patiala, could be the answer to the state's growing groundwater crisis as they can harvest rainwater and cushion against flooding. Posted on 16 Nov, 2015 10:45 AM

The northern region of India is facing drought for the second consecutive year.

Harmesh Singh has taken to rainwater harvesting on his farm since the groundwater has gone down.
Swachh Punjab' is a stinking reality
The state's high toilet coverage has compounded the problem of water pollution and diseases. It now needs an efficient and affordable sewage treatment system. Posted on 13 Apr, 2015 12:54 PM

Whenever Nachatar Singh’s wife and children fall sick, he blames it on the groundwater they pull out everyday using a hand pump in his courtyard at Veere Wala Kalan village of Faridkot district. Singh swears that the problem started only recently. “The same tap used to fetch such good quality water thanks to seepage from the Gang canal which runs around 1 km from our place.

Not much distance between toilet and water source
Effects of industrial and agricultural activities on properties of groundwater - A paper published in the Bulletin of Environment, Pharmacology & Life Sciences
This paper published in the journal Bulletin of Environment, Pharmacology & Life Sciences describes the findings of a study that was carried out to check the effects of industrial and agricultural activities on the groundwater properties in terms of heavy metal concentration. Polluted groundwater is defined as groundwater that has higher concentrations of dissolved or suspended elements than the maximum permissible concentrations fixed by national or international standards for drinking, industrial or agricultural purposes. Sometimes natural groundwater pollution may also occur because of the presence of the respective substances above the prescribed limits. Posted on 05 May, 2012 03:24 PM

The main sources of groundwater contamination are industrial, municipal and agricultural wastes (both solid and liquid), rocks, sludge and slimes, refuse, pesticides, herbicides, effluents from livestock and poultry farms. Many pollutants are even able to penetrate into groundwater aquifers.

×