Guruvayur, a
township in Kerala's Thrissur district and famous all over India for its
centuries old Sri Krishna temple, is still remaining obstreperously and
obstinately orthodox in its ritualistic religiosity. If a non-Hindu gets
darshan of the Krishna here, the temple will be polluted and Krishna
will need to take several baths. It was only recently the head priest
had conducted punyaham (cleansing ritual using water) following the
entry of Mercy Ravi, wife of Union Minister for NRI Affairs Vayalar
Ravi, who happens to be a born Christian.
But a recent analytical test conducted by Environmental Engineering
Laboratory of Department of Civil Engineering at Government Engineering
College in Thrissur is pointing to the other side of the coin. It proves
beyond doubt that the water being used by the Brahmanic high priests to
conduct the cleansing ritual itself remains impure. As per the report,
the MPN count for coliforms in the temple tank comes around 1100/100 ml
and the BOD (3 days, 27 degree centigrade) remains 22.8 mg/L. The
permissible level of MPN for drinking water is 50 and for bating water
500 as per Central Pollution Control Board. The BOD permitted is 2 and 3
mg/L respectively. It would not be a Herculean task to find out the
reason behind the severe pollution of the temple tank, which continues
to remain a symbol of `purity' and `cleansing' for millions of devotees.
Excreta and human and non-human organic waste from 110 odd lodges and an
equal number of marriage halls, chatrams run by Guruvayur Devaswom Board
and restaurants are making the temple tank polluted. But astonishingly,
there is no hue and cry for the cleaning up of the tank though the
elements of orthodoxy are still vocal of the need to bar entry of
non-Hindus. The god is bathing in water contaminated by human excreta as
there is no working septic tank for any of the lodges and restaurants in
the temple town.
If the affairs of the god have dipped into such a pathetic condition,
what would have been the survival struggles of his own people living
just outside the township? Take a trip to Chakkamkandam backwater region
by keeping a firm grip over your nostrils. The excreta and other organic
wastes of Guruvayur are now being let out into what used to be a
rain-water drainage system which leads to the back waters in a way that
affects about a dozen panchayats outside Guruvyur Municipal limits,
translated in people terms more than 1500 families – most of whom are
dependant on backwaters for their livelihood, be it fishing or coir
making.
K .V. Rugmini is a devote Hindu and she often visits the temple to pary
to her favourite god. Now-a-days, she demands only one thing from her
favourite god. ``Please find some solution to the free flowing of human
excreta through the open drainage system to the backwaters. My house is
very close to the drain and the children feel vomiting tendency whenever
sit for food. More over, the water in my recently constructed 5 feet
depth well remains extremely polluted. Only the god can prevent the ever
growing number of visitors to the temple,'' she said.
Puthuveetil Amina is a 65-year-old woman. She lives alone in her old
house just in front of the drainage. The water in her well also is not
potable and has no access to pipe water. So she is drinking the same
filthy water.
According to Manikantan, who used to fetch fine varieties of fish from
the backwaters to make a living, no one in the entire district buys fish
from the region. No takers for shell fish varieties like mussels as
well. Those who engaged in fishing started opting other means of
survival due to poor demand and the infection of skin diseases due to
contamination of water. Human excreta were seen flowing over the water
in the entire backwater region. Except for the high pollution,
Chakkamkandam has immense tourism possibilities. A holiday home with
about a dozen cottages was constructed close to the backwaters eyeing on
the visiting tourists but the promoter is accumulating losses due to the
absence of visitors. The Kerala Home Minister, who also in-charge of
tourism, had refused to drink even tender coconut water at the inaugural
of the holiday home due to the severe air pollution.
``In October, last year, the whole of Kerala rose in outrage against
three containers of Garbage that was imported from New York to Kochi by
a private company. A good part of the outrage was against using Kochi as
a dumping ground for garbage generated in the US. Though what is
happening in Chakkamkandam Backwaters is repetition of the same story,
it is not invoking the same outrage somehow,'' wonders Bobby Kunhu, a
lawyer turned environmental activist.
``The question here in the first instance is how these lodges run
without a working septic tank. Logically follows the question on how the
Guruvayur Municipal Corporation allows these lodges etc to function
thus,'' he asks. ``The legal questions have been answered by the Supreme
Court of India long back. Justice Krishna Iyer delivering the judgment
in Municipal Corporation of Ratlam vs. Vardichand and Others AIR 1980 SC
160 accepted the use of sec. 133 CrPC for removal of public nuisance and
observed that a responsible municipal council is constituted for the
precise purpose of preserving public health. Further, in M.C. Mehta vs.
Union of India WP 12739/1985, Justice Bhagwati upheld the principle of
"Polluter Pays" in the case of Oleum Gas leak from a private company
called Shriram Fertilizers and diluted the principle of locus standi
holding the state equally responsible for the pollution,'' he further
says.
In the case of excreta from Guruvyur lodges, the facts take a grotesque
turn, where in the first place the Municipal Corporation has not
enforced a legal obligation on the part of the lodge owners to construct
and operate functional septic tanks to deal with human excreta and other
wastes on one hand. And then facilitates the release of the same into an
area outside their jurisdiction, which on top of all illegalities falls
within the Coastal Regulatory Zone. To add insult to the injury that the
Corporation is inflicting on this hapless people, they have also planned
a sewage treatment plant filling parts of the backwaters that is outside
their jurisdiction. The comedy of this plan is that the plant was
planned at a cost of Rupees 4.4 Million in 1982, when Rs.5.5 Million
already had been spent, and all one gets to see of it is an asbestos
tool shed on a part of the backwaters that has been filled for this
purpose.
``The canal leading to the backwaters has become a breeding center for
mosquitoes and the putrefaction of wastes takes place all along the
course of the canal,'' pointed out C.F.Goerge, a member of the local
action committee.
``As per an independent study, the backwaters have been partially filled
with the sludge from the decomposition of the night soil. The mangroves
in the backwaters which recess at many places are in the dying stage,''
he added. Most of the coir manufacturing units around the backwaterl
have been closed due to extreme level of pollution. Skin and intestinal
diseases are very common among the Chakkamkandam people. ``The ruling
Left Front Government is only concerned about the cleanliness of
Guruvayur Township. It has conveniently forgotten the surrounding
villages. If the sewage treatment plant is set up here, the effluent,
treated as well asuntreated will be disposed in to the backwater
directly, making it a dead and infectious lagoon,'' he pointed out.
The impunity with which the lodge owners and the Guruvayur Municipal
Corporation has acted without consideration for the livelihood and
hygiene of over a dozen adjacent panchayats, directly affected by the
pollution and the proposed sewage plant can be evidenced by a petition
filed before the Kerala High Court O.P. No. 19891 of 1997, where the
affected communities went unrepresented and the material facts were not
placed before the court, thereby obtaining an order clearing the way for
the sewage plant. Further, till date there has been no effort at
consulting with the populations that are directly affected by the
pollution or would be affected by the outdated proposal for a sewage
treatment plant.
``The questions that need to be asked here is whether the residents
around Chakamkandam Backwaters should pay for the profits being made by
the lodge, hotel and auditorium owners of Guruvayur? Should the
Guruvayur Municipal Corporation be complicit in facilitating this
profit? And finally, does not the Municipal Corporation have a
responsibility to enforce working excretion disposal mechanisms – septic
tanks or otherwise in these establishments?'' asks Bobby.
But the civil society around Guruvayur is in one voice against the
sewage plant. ``The Government should construct septic tanks for each
and every hotel, lodge and restaurant in Guruvayur. That would be more
economical and more scientific. Bothe the twon ship and the rural areas
would be freed from all kinds of pollution,'' points out Laila hamza,
member of the local panchayat. As an independent who won the election
with the support of ruling leftists, she is now earning the wrath of
party men for leading the civil society uprise.
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Guruvayur, a
township in Kerala's Thrissur district and famous all over India for its
centuries old Sri Krishna temple, is still remaining obstreperously and
obstinately orthodox in its ritualistic religiosity. If a non-Hindu gets
darshan of the Krishna here, the temple will be polluted and Krishna
will need to take several baths. It was only recently the head priest
had conducted punyaham (cleansing ritual using water) following the
entry of Mercy Ravi, wife of Union Minister for NRI Affairs Vayalar
Ravi, who happens to be a born Christian. 