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Title:A prayer for the Ganges: across India, environmentalists battle a tide of
troubles to clean up a river revered as the source of life.

A blue stream spews from beneath brick factory buildings in Kanpur, India. The dark ribbon
curls down a dirt embankment and flows into the Ganges River. "That's toxic runoff," says
Rakesh Jaiswal, a 48-year-old environmental activist, as he leads. We're walking through the
tannery district, established along the Ganges during British colonial rule and now its major
polluter.

I'm not prepared for the sights and smells that greet me. Jaiswal stares grimly at the runoff--it's
loaded with chromium sulfate, used as a leather preservative and associated with cancer of the
respiratory tract, skin ulcers and renal failure. Arsenic, cadmium, mercury, sulfuric acid,
chemical dyes and heavy metals can also be found in this witches' brew. Though Kanpur's
tanneries have been required since 1994 to cleanup before channeling wastewater, many ignore
the costly regulation.

A few yards upstream, we follow a foul odor to a violent flow of untreated domestic sewage
gushing into the river from an old brick pipe. The bubbling torrent is full of fecal
microorganisms responsible for typhoid, cholera and amoebic dysentery. Ten million to 12
million gallons of raw sewage have been pouring out of this drainpipe each day, Jaiswal tells me,
since the main sewer line leading to the treatment plant in Kanpur became clogged--five years
ago. "We've been protesting against this, and begging the [Uttar Pradesh state] government to
take action, but they've done nothing," he says.

Half a dozen young fishermen standing by a rowboat offer to take us to a sandbar in the middle
of the Ganges for "a better view." Jaiswal and I climb into the boat and cross the shallow river
only to run aground 50 yards from the sandbar. "You have to get out and walk from here," a
boatman tells us. We remove our shoes, roll up our trousers and nervously wade knee-deep in the
toxic stream. As we reach the sandbar, just downstream from a Hindu cremation ground, we're
hit by a rotten smell and a horrifying sight: lying on the sand are a human rib cage, a femur, and,
near-by, a yellow-shrouded corpse. "It's been rotting there for a month," a fisherman tells us. The
clothed body of a small child floats a few yards off the island. Although the state government
banned the dumping of bodies a decade ago, many of Kanpur's poor still discard their loved ones
in secret at night. Wild dogs prowl around the bones and bodies, snarling when we get too close.
"They live on the sandbar, feeding on the remains," a fisherman tells us.

Sickened, I climb back into the rowboat. As we near the tanneries, a dozen boys frolic in the
water, splashing in the river's foulest stretch. Jaiswal calls them over.

"Why do you swim in the river?" I ask one of the boys. 'Aren't you worried?"

He shrugs. "We know it's poisonous," he says, "but after we swim we go wash off at home."

"Do you ever get ill?"

"We all get rashes," he replies, "but what can we do?"

Walking back toward the main road, Jaiswal seems hopeless. "I would never have imagined the
River Ganga could get like this, with stinking water, green and brown colored," he says. "It's
pure toxic muck."

I shake my head at the irony. For more than two millennia, the River Ganges has been respected
by millions as a symbol of spiritual purity. Originating in the Himalayas, the river travels 1,600
miles across the crowded plains of the subcontinent before flowing east into Bangladesh and
from there spilling into the Bay of Bengal. "Mother Ganga" is described by ancient Hindu
scriptures as a gift from the gods. "Man becomes pure by the touch of the water, or by
consuming it, or by expressing its name," Lord Vishnu proclaims in the Ramayana, the Sanskrit
epic poem composed four centuries before Christ. Modern admirers have written about the river's
beauty historical importance and holiness. "The Ganges is above all the river of India, which has
held India's heart captive and drawn uncounted millions to her banks since the dawn of history,"
Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, proclaimed.

For some time now, this romantic view of the Ganges has collided with India's gloomy realities.
During the past three decades, the country's explosive growth (at nearly 1.2 billion people,
India's population is second only to China's), industrialization and rapid urbanization have put
unyielding pressure on the sacred stream.

Hamer, Joshua. "A prayer for the Ganges: across India, environmentalists battle a tide of troubles to
clean up a river revered as the source of life." Smithsonian Nov. 2007: 74+. Junior Edition. Web. 23 Feb.
2010.