SACHI, the Society for Art and Cultural Heritage of India and the Center for South Asia at Stanford Invite You to Join a Panel Discussion and Illustrated Talk

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SACHI, The Society for Art and Cultural Heritage of India and The Center for South Asia at Stanford invite you to join a panel discussion and illustrated talk: Saving the River Ganga in an Age of Pollution: Can India's River Goddess be restored to health? with Dr. Bailey Green and Catherine Porter Sunday, Sep. 18, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. Braun Hall, Chemistry Bldg., Stanford University campus Free Admission and Open to the Public. Q & A will follow the two presentations. Dr. Bailey Green and Dr. Veer Bhadra Mishra in Varanasi Considered the holiest –and yet most polluted, the the Friends of the Ganges, USA have been battling threatened Ganga River brings a crisis. On the one for over 30 years to implement scientifically hand, it is seen as a goddess that can carry away researched clean water regulations, aimed at impurities, both spiritual and physical. On the restoring the river to health. other, people mindlessly continue to defile the river with human, industrial and toxic wastes. Panel discussants Dr. Bailey Green, President, Can we assume the river is purifying if it is GO2 Water, an East Bay water solutions company polluted? The condition of the river is so dire and invited to implement an innovative AIWPS the effects of the river’s pollution on human and technology, and Catherine Porter, Executive environmental health considered so dangerous, President, Friends of the Ganges, USA both that there is an urgency to address hazards posed actively involved in the Varanasi Ganges clean up by dangerously unsafe water quality. efforts will discuss how science, technology, religion, and environmentalism intersect in an The struggle to clean the river has a long history. ongoing challenge to bring hope to India’s Ironically, the powerful environmental movement millions who look to the river as a lifeline and a was fuelled by spiritual motivation in concern for source of spiritual nourishment. the river, revered as a Mother. The Varanasi based Sankat Mochan Foundation led by Dr. Veer Bhadra For questions please email [email protected] Mishra, a head priest cum hydraulic engineer, and or [email protected].

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