The Yamuna, India's most polluted river

[Music] [Laughter] composition of the liquid has changed it doesn't have any properties of water left [Music] cleaning is very important [Music] water crime [Music] the yamuna river in north india begins high up in the himalayas and teems with life for hundreds of kilometers in the indian capital of delhi it undergoes an astonishing transformation this is the vajra barbara this is the yamuna enter up to this point into the delahed on that side water is cleaned before barrage water come from the himalaya region origin of the amna point so it's clean 400 kilometers 400 kilometers and then the next 22 kilometers okay okay okay okay okay basically this is the same water okay before the veras and after the veras yumna is basically killed by the human activities in this water heavy metals toxic metals pesticides all are present [Music] oxygen levels in parts of the river are zero no animal life can be sustained [Music] but human life on the river continues [Music] planting crops along the yamuna was banned by india's supreme court they feared the food supply might be tainted [Music] but the law is barely enforced and every day thousands of kilograms of vegetables grown in yamuna water find their way into delhi's homes and restaurants [Music] it's hard to see the state of the armenia today is anything but a tragedy but some make the best of it people like sekanda have been working off this river for 30 years he scours this whole section looking for trash and he earns maybe 5 or 10 rupees for each piece he says he can make up to 5 000 rupees every month and that for him the state of the river right now it's not such a bad thing oh i am foreign foreign [Applause] [Music] once a year tens of thousands of pilgrims gather on its banks in the towns of matura and brindavan to pray and immerse themselves in the water believing it brings them good health and prosperity [Applause] [Music] a [Music] [Music] foreign outside a asari dying factory near mathura one of the towns that lines the yamuna river it isn't just sewage that's pumped into the river every day it's also a lot of industrial effluent in this case uh chemicals a byproduct of the salary dyeing process as you can see it's flowing pretty freely into local drains from here it'll make its way into the yamato and onto people's food and water supplies eventually someone will be drinking this [Music] more than 60 million people rely on the yamana for their water supply including the residents of patipachukai village near agra it's a relatively wealthy community but a few years ago people here started getting sick so this is the filter that the government came to install yes yes what's the problem with it so no it is not working now it asked for service in uh twice in a year but since last five years it is not serviced at all uh on not for a single time only so the water comes out of the ground yeah it's pumped into here which is supposed to clean it stored into that uh tank and then it comes to that filter but this thing doesn't clean anymore no no no no this is not cleaned anymore so the water comes added this is the this is the only outlet for that filtered water but now as you know it is a simple water only a normal water so what happens to people who drink that water uh peoples are having many problems like pains in their joints and they are not able to move not able to walk properly and do the villagers know that the water they're drinking yeah they know but uh there is no other option to live if they have to survive then they will have to drink this water [Music] nearby in the city of agra local activist bridge candlewall is fighting to rescue the river at its most famous point when this building was constructed here one of the major reasons was the river which the mughals thought was a much better river than the one in heaven because of the water quality what's it looked like back then oh it was in fact babari himself had written the water of the river it was as good as nectar but today it's so scary [Music] [Applause] [Music] the utrecht high court has ruled in a judgment that both ganga and yamna the oldest of indian rivers they are living entities and from the judgement also follows that the river has some basic human rights how can the human rights of a river really be enforced if it is a living entity as the uttarakhand high court says then every living entity has basic human rights but the number of people killing this river must number in the millions everyone who openly defecates on its banks is in a small way responsible for its murder that is true but we have agencies which are supposed to regulate anti-social activities politics has so far failed to clean the amina in agra residents are looking elsewhere for help one evening they held a prayer ceremony on the riverbank to bless bricks they hope might one day be used in a barrage that would raise water levels in the city we took the initiative of inviting everybody who was concerned with the river to the riverbank and initiate action by doing havan and puja of stones which we will place eventually when the foundation is led by the government [Music] the action has to continue we will go to the cjm court and people who are responsible for the death of a river they have to be punished [Music]

Channel: The Guardian

Views: 8,508,289

Keywords: india, indian, delhi, new delhi, pollution, yamuna, ganges, polluted, heavy metal, toxic metal, toxic, hindu, religion, indian gods, indian goddess, yamuna river, india's most polluted river, sewage, sewers, open sewer, water, himalayas, planet earth, climate change, india pollution, most polluted river in the world, yamuna river pollution, yamuna river foam, yamuna river delhi, the yamuna, india river, ganges river, dirty india, yamuna india, water pollution, india dirty, ganga river

Id: eHCaIvPN2rY

Length: 9min 58sec (598 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 07 2017