Ganga Utsav, 2020

Why in NEWS ?

• Ganga Utsav to conclude on National River Day i.e. 04th November 2020, in presence of Union Minister of Jal Shakti.

About Ganga Utsav

• On November 2, 2020, the Ganga Utsav begun virtually. The festival is to continue till November 4, 2020.
• The Ganga Utsav is being organised by the National Mission for Clean Ganga celebrating the 12th anniversary of declaring River Ganges as National river.
• The event was organised jointly by the Ministry of Jal Shakti.
• The Ganga Task Force as a part of celebration conducted afforestation drives with NCC cadets.
• The National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) celebrates the festival every year.
• NMCG is the implementation wing of National Ganga Council, set up in 2016, which replaced the National Ganga River Basin Authority (NRGBA).

Aim

• The three-day festival aims to promote stakeholder engagement and ensure public participation.
• To connect masses to the cause of river rejuvenation and sensitize them about ecological issues through conversations and entertainment.

Events and Activities

• It celebrates mystical and cultural river Ganga through storytelling, folklores, dialogues with eminent personalities, quizzes, displaying traditional art forms, dance and music performance by renowned artists, photo galleries and exhibitions and much more.
• The three-day event of Ganga Utsav activities broadly can be put in 6 broad themes. These broad themes are Ganga Dialogue, Story Telling, Cultural Events, Mini Ganga Quest, Ganga Film Festival and release of Movies and publications.
• During the Ganga Utsav, several activities will also be held in Ganga states by the local administration and NGOs, who are associated with Namami Gange Mission

National River

• Ganga was declared as the National River of India on 4th November 2008
• The Ganges is the longest river of India. It flows over 2,510 km of valleys, mountains and plains. The Ganges originates from Gangotri Glacier as River Bhagirathi. Later it joins the Alaknanda at Devprayag and becomes the Ganges.
• The major tributaries of Ganga river are Yamuna, Gandak, Ghagra, Kali, Son and RamGanga. The river drains in 11 states namely Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Punjab, Rajasthan, Haryana, West Bengal.
• The Ganges joins River Brahmaputra and flows into the Bay of Bengal as River Padma in Bangladesh.

The National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG)

• NMCG was implemented by the National Council for Rejuvenation, Protection and Management of River Ganga on August 12, 2011 under the Societies Registration Act,1860 as a registered society.
• This programe under the National Ganga Council is supported by the State level Programme Management Groups (SPMGs) in the state such as Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.
• This initiative was started by the Government of India to address the pollution of river Ganga by providing financial and technical assistance.
• It acted as an implementation arm of the National Ganga River Basin Authority(NGRBA) which was constituted under the provisions of the Environment (Protection) Act (EPA),1986.
• NGRBA has since been dissolved with effect from the 7th October 2016, consequent to constitution of National Council for Rejuvenation, Protection and Management of River Ganga (referred as National Ganga Council).
• NMCG has a two tier management structure and comprises the Governing Council and Executive Committee.

Structure

The act envisages five tier structure at national, state and district level to take measures for prevention, control and abatement of environmental pollution in river Ganga and to ensure continuous adequate flow of water so as to rejuvenate the river Ganga as below-

1. National Ganga Council under the chairmanship of Prime Minister.
2. Empowered Task Force (ETF) on river Ganga under chairmanship of Hon’ble Union Minister of Jal Shakti (Department of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation).
3. National Mission for Clean Ganga(NMCG).
4. State Ganga Committees and
5. District Ganga Committees in every specified district abutting river Ganga and its tributaries in the states.

National River Day

• In year 2019, in order to create awareness about river conservation through activities, 4th November was declared as National River Day, as it was on November 4, 2008 that the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had declared the Ganga as ‘National River of India’.
• Second edition of National River Day will be celebrated with closing ceremony of Ganga Utsav 2020 on 4 th November 2020, a three day festival to celebrate Ganga as national river of India.