The politics of Chhath Puja continues unabated even as devotees thronged the polluted Yamuna to offer their prayers to the setting sun on Wednesday evening. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) continued to accuse the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of playing politics over the festivities, while the BJP hit back saying that the AAP has not taken any initiative during all these years for water treatment and as a result, the rise of water pollution in Yamuna ghat has increased further. Meanwhile, the Delhi High Court dismissed a plea challenging decision to prohibit the devotees from performing Chhath Puja at the banks of the Yamuna river.
During a press conference on Wednesday, chief spokesperson of the AAP, Saurabh Bharadwaj, said that the Delhi government was trying hard to help people celebrate Chhatt Puja, but the BJP consistently attempted to stir up trouble. He also said that the Delhi government built artificial ponds, along with tents, mics, sound systems and so forth since this year’s “Chhatt puja would not be celebrated near the Yamuna River because of the rise of toxicity level”.
During the conference, he said that the BJP was trying to create conflict. But after Dwarka MLA Vinay Mishra of AAP raised an allegation against BJP, the latter refuted the claim. The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) lodged an FIR against Dwarka-MLA Vinay Mishra of AAP regarding the building of ghats.
Also, he said that the BJP began claiming that Yamuna river was filled with industrial trash soon before the MCD election, but AAP, on the other hand, had begun to undertake sewage treatment. The capacity of sewage treatment plants (STPs) expanded over the last six years, and the government wanted to boost capacity by 500 MGD by 2022.
However, the BJP said that many party workers took several initiatives to clean the Yamuna. “Currently, we are witnessing toxic foams in Yamuna river. However, the BJP has already taken initiatives to clean up the river,” Sunita, SDMC councillor from Madipur, BJP, told The Daily Guardian.
“Initially, the AAP claimed that the DDMA had prohibited the celebration of festivals due to Covid restrictions; however, due to the rise of toxic foam, the celebrations are not allowed at the moment. For the people of Purvanchal, Chhatt is a big festival, but the AAP is demeaning them by not permitting them to celebrate it. The problem of pollution in Yamuna river is not new, and the AAP is discriminating against Purvanchal residents,” Mahesh Verma, Media Co-Head, Delhi BJP, told this newspaper.
BJP West Delhi MP Parvesh Verma said that despite police barricades, the people had arrived and celebrated the festival at Yamuna Ghat in ITO. BJP MP Manoj Tiwari also reached the Yamuna Ghat in Sonia Vihar to perform the rituals.
The Delhi High Court refused to pass any direction on a petition observing that the petitioners took no steps to approach the respondents even after the list of designated sites in their area was made public. Justice Rekha Palli said that there is no merit in the petition and the petitioners have not pointed out how devotees are entitled to perform Chhath Puja at the banks of Yamuna.
The court noted that that the puja has commenced today and therefore no order for alternative designated sites at this stage can be passed. According to the counsel of the petitioner, authorities concerned have illegally and unreasonably prohibited the devotees from performing Chhat Puja at the banks of the Yamuna river without assigning any reason in their notifications/orders.
The petitioner has sought to quash the impugned orders dated 29 October 2021, and 30 October 2021, and the actionable points for Chhath Puja-2021, whereby and to the extent it was decided that ‘no site shall be designated on the banks of river Yamuna’ being illegal, unreasonable, vague, and the result of arbitrariness. DDMA on October 29 had permitted to perform Chhath puja with imposing certain restrictions including not performing Puja at banks of Yamuna.
The Delhi government told the court that 800 designated sites are created in the national capital for performing puja and there are seven designated sites in the vicinity of the national capital.
The petitioners—Chhath Puja Samaj Sudhar Samiti, Sonia Vihar, and Bihar Mitra Sangathan, Karwal Nagar—said that notifications have caused infringement to their fundamental rights of worship. The petition filed by advocate K.K. Jha and associates said that the environmentalists have claimed that the festival of Chhath is one of the most eco-friendly religious festivals that should be used to spread “the message of nature conservation”.