Ganga
The River Ganges (Ganga in Indian languages) is a major river in northern India. The earthly origins of Ganga lie several hundred miles south of Kailasha in the Gangotri Glacier, a mountain of ice nearly twenty miles long and three miles wide, surrounded by peaks twenty one thousand to twenty four thousand feet high.
From here its two main sources, the Alaknanda and Bhagirithi flow past the sacred villages of Badrinath and Gangotri long since regarded as the most revered centres of pilgrimage. Further south, the Alaknanda river is joined by Mandakini, a lesser source that rises near Kedarnath, another centre of pilgrimage. Then on, the Ganga flows across the large plains of North India (called the Gangetic Plains) and empties into the Bay of Bengal after dividing up into many  distributaries. One of them is the Hoogli River near Kolkata, another major distributary being the Padma River that enters Bangladesh.
To the reader who has not seen the Ganga, this verse may seem to express a mere ancient superstition. But those who have seen and experienced the mighty river would know why she is holy and why those who love her are mukta - set free. (A.L. Basham)
The divine origin of Ganga finds mention in most ancient Indian literature. When the likes of the mighty Kings Dilip and Sagar failed in persuading the celestial river to manifest itself on earth, it was sage Bhagiratha, who with his Tapa (Penance) succeeded in invoking the river to leave its heavenly abode and bless the ashes of his forefathers.
The episode of Bhagiratha Prayatna finds mention in Mahabharata’s Vana Parva, Bal Kand of Ramayana, Brahmanda Purana, Padma Purana and in Bhagwat Purana. Generations after generations, this great story is retold in every Hindu household and children are inspired to make similar sacrifices to achieve great causes.
Besides Ramanyan and Mahabharata, puran, Agnipurana, Skanda Purana, Matsya Purana, Brahmanda Purana, Vishnu Purana, Divi Purana and Bhagvad Purana shed light on diverse aspects of the mighty river. The holy waters of the river play a vital role in Hindu ceremonies, in rituals of birth and initiation of marriage and death. As a Goddess, she has moved among the great celestials of Hinduism: at times the child of Brahma, the wife of Shiva, the metaphysical product of Vishnu or mother to the Vasus and to Kartikeya. Ganga has been a cradle of human civilization since time immemorial. Many Indians depend on this great  river for their physical, psychological and spiritual sustenance. Ganga is a perennial river and people have great belief in her powers of healing and regeneration. Ganga known variously as Hiranyagarbha, Amritvahini, Tripathga, Patitpavini is deeply mingled with the Indian psyche and ethos. The role of Ganga in the birth and shaping of the Indian civilization has been recorded in the Vedas and in many modern works on the river. It would be no exaggeration to say that the sacredness and purity of the river is incomparable and unparalleled. It was on the banks of this great river in prehistory the Indian civilization was born. It was on the banks of this great river that many beautiful Kingdoms and towns came up. It was here that a complex, fascinating and live historical process of human interfacing was started in the dim distant past. It was on the banks of this mighty river that the Indian race discovered and nurtured its deep philosophical moorings. It can only be an irony of history that with the passage of time this mighty river is today a victim of defilement and pollution by the very human race that finds sustenance by it. At Deoprayag, the Alaknanda joins the Bhagirathi, the other main source of Ganga which rises beyond the pilgrimage centre of Gangotri. The route to Gangotri follows steep mountainsides along the Bhagirathi Valley, passing among dense forests of cedar and pine and through little towns. The approach is through a rocky defile that booms with the sound of the river. But the true source of the Ganga is at Gaumukh, the giant ice cave at a height of 13,500 feet. From here and Badrinath, the great sources descend to the sangam at Deoprayag, where they become the Ganges. Flowing south it passes through Rishikesh, the last point in the Himalayas before Ganga enters the plains. At the point where Ganga enters the plains, breaking out between the hills lies Haridwar. The total length of the river is about 2,507 km (1,558 miles). One of the densest human population belts on earth is built around the Ganges.
The region encompassing the delta near the Bay of Bengal coast is known as The Sundarbans (Beautiful Forests) – a region of thick mangrove forests, and one of the major habitats of the Royal Bengal tiger.
The Ganges Basin is incredibly fertile and, at present, about one in every 12 people in the world (8%) live in its catchment area. However, due to this incredible concentration of population, pollution and destruction of habitats is increasing at an alarming rate in the region.
The Yamuna River — a major river in its own right, and nearly as sacred — is a tributary of the Ganga, and their confluence is near what is the site of the traditional holy Hindu city of Prayag, now known as Allahabad.
Two species of dolphin can be found in the Ganges, the Ganges River Dolphin and the Irrawaddy Dolphin. The Ganges is also notable in that it contains a rare species of freshwater shark, Glyphis gangeticus about which little is known.
Ganga in Hinduism
Ganga is personified in Hinduism as a goddess: Maa Ganga (Mother Ganga). Hindu legend makes her the foster-mother of Karttikeya, who was actually a son of Shiva and Parvati. 
Several places sacred to Hindus lie along the banks of the river Ganga, including Haridwar and Varanasi. It is believed that taking a dip in the river will wash away one's sins, and that having one's ashes disposed of in the Ganga after death may improve one's next life or even allow Moksha to be attained sooner. Devout Hindus make pilgrimages to bathe in the Ganga and to meditate on its banks.
According to the mythological legend, Brahma collected the sweat of Vishnu's feet and created Ganga. Being touched by two members of the Trimurthi, Ganga became very holy.
Several years later, a king named Sagar magically acquired sixty thousand sons. One day, King Sagar performed a ritual of worship for the good of the Kingdom. One of the integral parts of the ritual was a horse, which was stolen by the jealous Indra. Sagar sent all his sons all over the Earth to search for the horse. They found it in the Underworld next to a penitent sage Kapila. Believing that the sage had stolen the horse, they hurled insults at him and caused his penance to be disturbed. The sage opened his eyes for the first time in several years, and looked at the sons of Sagar. With this glance, all sixty thousand were burnt to death.
The souls of the sons of Sagar wandered as ghosts since their final rites had not been performed. When Bhagiratha, one of the descendants of Sagar by a second wife, learnt of this fate, he vowed to bring Ganga down to Earth so that she could sweep away the ashes to heaven.
Bhagiratha prayed to Brahma that Ganga come down to Earth. Brahma agreed, and he ordered Ganga to  go down to the Earth and then on to the Underworld so that the souls of Bhagiratha's ancestors would be able to go to Heaven. The vain Ganga felt that this was insulting and decided to sweep the whole Earth away as she fell from the Heavens. Alarmed, Bhagiratha prayed to Shiva that he break up Ganga's descent.
Ganga arrogantly fell on Shiva's head. But Shiva calmly trapped her in his hair and let her out in small streams. The touch of Shiva further sanctified Ganga. As Ganga travelled to the Underworld, she created a different stream to remain on Earth to help purify unfortunate souls there.
Because of Bhagiratha's efforts Ganga descended on to earth and hence the river is also known as Bhagirathi.html, and the term "Bhagirath prayatna" is used to describe valiant efforts or difficult achievements.
Another name that Ganga is known by is Jahnavi. Story has it that once Ganga came down to earth, on her way to Bhagiratha, her rushing waters created turbulence and destroyed the fields of a sage called Jahnu. He was angered by this and drank up all of Ganga's waters. Upon this, the Gods prayed to Jahnu to release Ganga so that she could proceed on her mission. Pleased with their prayers, Jahnu released Ganga (her waters) from his ears. Hence the name "Jahnavi" (daughter of Jahnu) for Ganga.
Pollution
The pollution of Ganga is becoming increasingly worse as time goes on. Pollution that is found in the Ganges include cremated corpses, livestock carcasses, raw sewage, waste from factories, and the used water from peoples' daily lives. There have been many attempts to clean up the Ganges, but they have either failed or made the problem worse. India's government has already spent over $33 million to address the overwhelming sewage problem.
References
- Darian, Steven G.,The Ganges in Myth and History, The University Press of Hawaii, Honolulu (1978) [ISBN 0824805097]
- Newby, Eric, Slowly down the Ganges, Lonely Planet Publications (1998) [ISBN 0864426313]
See also
errata
The Eternal Ganga
VISION FOR GANGA
When we attempt to reconcile the significance of the sacred river in the past to its present reality, a most tragic paradox is encountered. Ganga today is being worshipped and defiled simultaneously. In fact, at most times, the process of worship itself has a polluting influence since bulk of the worship materials are disposed off in the river in ugly non-biodegradable polythene bags and in other unthinking ways. Today Ganga is the natural home and recipient of half burnt dead bodies, unclaimed bodies, animal carcasses, washermen’s points, dairies and cattle bathing points, garbage from the slums, open defecation along the river and domestic and industrial effluents of all kinds. Whatever remains of the endangered species of dolphins and the turtles are openly poached. The coexistence of worship and defilement of the Ganga defies logic and reason and leaves most observers confused.
Polluting socio-religious practices apart, Ganga since perhaps about a century, has been subjected to a multiplicity of serious threats, multiplying in their impact and intensity every second. Planners in independent India have approached the river and its pollution with frightening ad-hocism. Adherents of the existing developmental model in India, still consider the pollution of the river as inevitable, also perhaps as an acceptable cost in the process of development.
Ganga waters have been freely diverted and dammed for a myriad reasons, not least on account of powering a so-called Green Revolution in agriculture. Unplanned urbanization and industrialization together with the population boom have extracted a very heavy price from the river. The waters of Ganga have been and continue to be treated as just another input, an economic resource, to turn the mighty wheels of development.
'The western model of development has been and continues to be blindly, almost slavishly, imitated in India without the safeguards. Over time, in between passing of ambitious national laws on protection of environment and international pledges for sustainable development, the government did take notice of the alarming threats to the life of the river. However, instead of a comprehensive, sustained and intensive attack on pollution in the river, action could not proceed beyond taking of symbolic steps. There was and exists a wide chasm between the promise of Ganga Action Plan and the reality of millions of litres of all kinds of pollution meeting the river every single minute. Inaccurate, partial and self-laudatory reports have become the norm but do precious little to make significant forward movement on reversing the flow of pollution in the river. Admittedly, the task is Himalayan in nature and requires sustained convergence of comprehensive attempts by government, industries and civil society alike. In all this, the civil society has been a helpless and passive observer.
Everyone has a foot somewhere in polluting the river but no one could care less about doing anything about it. Very few Individuals and organizations are even attempting to do something beyond an occasional burst of green concerns, which are event driven and only perhaps serve to save ones’ own souls rather than saving the soul of Ganga.The painful reality still remains that environmental concerns in India continue to be the burden of a few green crusaders with the vast majority just plainly looking on. A serious erosion of faith has entered the psyche of the masses, gripping all with the thought that “nothing can be done”. The rapid rise in the pollution of the river has been accompanied by (and also because of) mass apathy.
Pollution and public concern of Ganga seem to exist in inverse ratios.If ever any crisis meant an opportunity to make a difference, it could not be truer than is the case for Ganga. The distressed river beckons all to come to its rescue.It took hundreds of years of penance by Sage Bhagirath to bring the celestial river to earth and it would not be an exaggeration to say that today Ganga requires many Bhagiraths to survive and reclaim its sacred nature.
Before any action can be initiated, all concerned should start thinking in terms of a new vision for Ganga. How do we want Ganga to be and what can be done to achieve that vision is the question posed to all of us. A new vision for a pristine and pure Ganga has to pour forth and translated on the ground. A new vision, which needs churning of the spirit and mind. A new vision that can inspire the masses to action. A new vision that needs to reconcile the competing demands on the precious waters of the river with sustainability. It needs to think of the river as one organic entity where tinkering in one-part affects the entire body of the river. A new ion which believes that if we as humans wish to survive, Ganga needs to survive.
The eternal Ganga today, needs new heroes and new voices. If you wish to respond to her call, the time is NOW.
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