Date:28/07/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/07/28/stories/2008072856600300.htm

Kerala - Pathanamthitta

Eco group presses for a clean Pampa

Staff Reporter

Points to M.S. Swaminathan Commission’s advocacy of the Pampa Action Plan

Pollution control necessary for effective implementation of Kuttanad Package: report
Report moots similar plans for the Achencoil, Manimala and Meenachil rivers

PATHANAMTHITTA: The Pampa Parirakshana Samiti has called upon the State government to implement the Pampa Action Plan (PAP) without any further delay as it is necessary to check the flow of filth from Sabarimala and various small towns situated on the banks of River Pampa into the backwaters of Kuttanad.

In a statement issued here on Sunday, N.K. Sukumaran Nair, samiti general secretary, said the Kuttanad package announced by the Union government on the basis of the report submitted by the M.S. Swaminathan Commission had stressed the need to implement PAP on a war footing.

According to Mr. Sukumaran Nair, besides Pampa, the two other rivers that empty out into the Vembanad Lake, Achencoil and Manimala, too were found to be contributing to the pollution of Kuttanad.

The M.S. Swaminathan Commission too maintains that the sewage flowing from Sabarimala through Pampa and Achencoil was a major cause of pollution in Kuttanad. “The Pampa Action Plan, pending implementation for quite sometime, should be implemented in a time frame of two to three years and the river sanitised from human and other solid wastes,” the report says. The report also stresses the need to develop similar cleaning projects for the Achencoil, Manimala and Meenachil rivers.

Mr. Sukumaran Nair alleged that the casual approach of State government had left the State’s first river conservation scheme under the National River Conservation Programme a non-starter. Though the Centre had allotted Rs.11.5 crore in May, 2003, for implementing the first phase of the scheme, the State had failed to comply with the guidelines fixed by the National River Conservation Directorate for implementing it, he alleged.

He added that the M.S. Swaminathan Commission report had suggested that controlling pollution in the Pampa, Achencoil, Manimala and Meenachil rivers was a grave necessity for effective implementation of the proposed Kuttanad Package.

Mr. Sukumaran Nair said that the Upper Kuttanad region, comprising Niranom, Peringara, Nedumpram, Kadapra and Kuttoor panchayats in Pathanamthitta district, too was given due consideration by the commission.