India's Holy River Ganges, is about to get a new lifeline from the World Bank. The bank will loan India one billion dollars hat will be used to clean up the river.
Ganges is arguably the most polluted river in the world. Yet it is India's Holy river and is considered sacred.
Ganges is badly polluted by sewage, chemicals and pesticides. Hundreds of millions of people use the river across India. Ganges is 1,500 mile, which is nearly 2500 kilometers long.
World Bank's president Robert Zoellick said the one billion dollar loan will be used to clean the entire network of the river Ganges. He spoke in Delhi.
The funding will help India end the discharge of untreated waste into the Ganges by 2020. Government will build sewage treatment plants and revamp the drains to improve the water quality of Ganges.
India has made earlier efforts to clean the water of Ganges. In fact, in 1989 the Indian government went as far as attempting to make the water of the river drinkable. However, those plans failed because they were segmented and did not look at the root problem of why the river is so polluted.
"What really distinguishes this project is to try to look at the whole river network and try to deal with all the aspects," said Zoellick in Delhi today.
Written by Armen Hareyan
Sources: World Bank, BBC
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