Centre sets up panel to draft an exclusive law on river Ganga

NEW DELHI: Moving forward on its decision to have an exclusive central law on the river Ganga to speed up the process of its rejuvenation, the Union water resources ministry on Friday set up a Committee, headed by justice (retired) Giridhar Malaviya, to prepare a draft legislation on the country's national river within three months.
Tenure of the Committee, having four other members, may be extended for three more months, if required.
The other members of the panel include V K Bhasin, ex-secretary of the legislative department of the government of India; A K Gosain of IIT Delhi and
Nayan Sharma of IIT Roorkee.
"The Committee has been asked to prepre a Draft Act on Ganga ensuring wholesomeness of the River. The Act should have provisions to ensure cleanliness (Nirmalta) and uninterrupted e-flow (avirlta) of Ganga", said the ministry while announcing the setting up of the panel.
It said, "The Committee may take into consideration any other issue which it may deem fit in the drafting of the Act."
The law, if enacted, will help the Centre to properly implement the inter-state nature of works through a coordinated manner. It may also provide the existing National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) legal teeth to its task of Ganga cleaning in a much more effective way.
The NGRBA is a key central body which monitors planning and execution of all schemes of Ganga rejuvenation in coordination with five river basin states -- Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.
The decision to have a central law on the river Ganga was taken in the last meeting of the NGRBA on July 4 when all the five states had agreed in-principle to have such legislation.
At present, local authorities have been handling the river pollution issue under the existing Water (prevention and control of pollution) Act which has, so far, remained ineffective in handling the matter due to inter-state nature of works and lack of punitive action.
It is learnt that the proposed legislation on Ganga will possibly arm the authorities with provisions to penalize the polluters including industries. Idea is to deal with polluters sternly so that the discharge of untreated water into the river can completely by stopped under a central law.
The Committee will take into account different draft proposals for this purpose while formulating the act. Converting the NGRBA into a commission under a Parliament Act is also one of the possible course.
Justice (retired) Malaviya - grandson of the freedom fighter and founder of the Banaras Hindu University (BHU) Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya - is Chairman of Ganga Mahasabha. He has long been associated with Ganga conservation movement. The Mahasabha was founded by Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya.