Express News Service
DEHRADUN: Chapped lips, sore throat and dimming light due to lack of water since March 7 are making 27-year-old Brahmachari Atmbodhananda from Matri Sadan of Haridwar look like a frail figure.
His body may have started to give signals to give up but his will to save Maa Ganga remains indomitable. I am ready to give up my life for Maa Ganga. We, saints, cannot sit back and watch while illegal mining, dam construction and pollution destroyed Maam Ganga and other divine rivers of Devbhoomi Uttrakhand, says Atmbodhananda.
A computer science graduate from Kerala, he had undertaken 194 days of agitation in phases earlier to save the holy river. He started his fast on February 23 and stopped consuming water on March 7.
Matri Sadan
Dehradun: In the backdrop of the Chamoli tragedy, the seers of Matri Sadan have decided to start their fast unto death from February 23 onwards unless the government decides to scrap all the hydropower plants on Ganga and Yamuna and their main tributaries.
Swami Shivanand Saraswati, the 70-year-old Ganga activist and founder of the Haridwar-based Matri Sadan, will be sitting on protest fast. The activist has tagged his protest a tapasya’ to save the Ganga.
The protest consists of four demands. Their three other demands include removal of stone crushers 5km away from the banks of Ganga, banning mining and quarrying on the Ganga riverbed from Raiwala to Raighat and formation of a Ganga Parishad .