Do we need to do Ganesh visarjan?

Recently the world-famous Ganesh festival or Ganeshotsav was concluded in India. It's a 10-day long festival where Ganesh (or Ganapati) idols are installed in many colorfully decorated homes and specially erected temporary structures in every locality (called mandals in Maharashtra). The festival is a pretty big deal in some cities in India, like Pune and Mumbai. At the end of festival time (which varies for homes, but for mandals it's normally 10 days) thousands of Ganesh idols get immersed in rivers, lakes, or wells (a process called Ganesh visarjan). They immerse all sizes of idols, big ones, and small ones, already water in rivers is very polluted around most of the cities and this immersion process makes it more dirty and contaminated. I am putting here a few pictures of some of the rivers and lakes which show a few scenes of the day after immersion day.

The pictures are self-explanatory, this process of Ganesh idol immersion (or Durga during Navaratri) takes a lot of toll on the environment. Actually, the public Ganesh festival (which mandals celebrate and the main culprit in this process) was revived by the very famous Indian freedom fighter and social reformer Lokamanya Tilak. He made this festival into well organized annual public event, his intention was to bridge the gap between different sections of society and cultivate the feeling of togetherness in people so that they unite and participate in the freedom struggle. It was a good idea and it served its purpose, it worked really well at that time. The festival still continues from those days but in a very different form now. People celebrate in their homes as well as many public mandals but one can easily notice the changed format. I'm not at all against public celebrations of these types of festivals, they are an integral part of our social and cultural life but all festivals and their way of celebration should also change with time. We change our diet, clothing style as well as rules and customs with time so these festivals also need to change. This Ganesh visarjan process causes a lot of environmental damage. Every year few people get drowned, lot of chemicals (colors used to paint these idols), and waste (plaster of paris, plastic, and other garbage) get dumped in rivers and lakes. Already these rivers and lakes are polluted because lot of waste from city sewage and companies and these types of festivals put additional strain on them. 

People care for these idols during the festival days, and there is a lot of concern to protect them from any intentional damage, there might be a law and order situation (if someone intentionally damages the idol). However, after the visarjan people just don't care what happens to these idols, whether they get deformed or mixed with sewage and junk, they just don't care. Sounds very strange to me, it's the same God whom people worship for 10 days and then just dump it in dirty water and forget about it. I also don't understand the purpose behind having such big idols that ultimately get immersed in water after 10 days. It's a waste of resources and money in a country like India. Big Ganesh idol doesn't mean that you are a BIG Ganesh devotee. Why can't they have Ganesh pictures or small idols with natural colors or recycle the same idols every year? I know some mandals do this but still, their number is not enough to prevent environmental damage. Why can't we get rid of this visarjan process altogether or make it just a symbolic one? I know that many people (especially Ganesh devotees) won't like this proposal and will question why I am only objecting to Ganeshotsav and not other festivals. This is about all festivals that impact our environment adversely and Ganeshotsav is just one example of it, I am taking it just as an example not the only reason for festive pollution.

I think we have to look at the ways we celebrate almost all of our festivals and see how we can minimize their impact on the environment. Already we are putting enough stress on our planet and its natural resources. With time everything changes and adapts to changing environments, that is what we call evolution. Festivals should also evolve to reduce their impact on nature not to increase the burden and it is our responsibility.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic. 

(Text Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)