Holy Ganges and Holy Cow ... forgotten by Hindus

The two visible symbols of holiness in Hinduism is dying a slow death and the religions seems too meek to resurrect the holiness...

• The Ganges
• The holy cow

Lets discuss the Ganges first

The Ganges enters India in the state of Uttaranchal, flows thru UttarPradesh, Bihar and WestBengal before she surrenders herself to the sea.The river's long-held reputation as a purifying river appears to have some basis in science. Its waters have been found to have unusual antimicrobial properties, shortening the survival time of pathogens. The underlying mechanism is unknown; possible explanations include antimicrobial peptides and bacteriophages. whatever be the scientific explanations the river is considered holy and has mentions in very old hindu texts such as vedas dating back to the times when aryan tribes arrived in India. Some 500 million people have been accomodated in the green belt created by this river.

But now it is one of the most polluted river in India.

According to official standards, water safe for bathing should not contain more than 500 faecal coliforms per 100ml, yet upstream of Varanasi's ghats the river water already contains 120 times as much, 60,000 faecal coliform bacteria per 100 ml.After passing through Varanasi, and receiving 32 streams of raw sewage from the city, the concentration of faecal coliforms in the river's waters rises from 60,000 to 1.5 million, with observed peak values of 100 million per 100 ml. Drinking and bathing in its waters therefore carries a high risk of infection.

Now lets come to Holy cow.

Hindus do not eat cow flesh because they consume her milk. So precisely she becomes the mother and you dont eat your mother. But in last 10-15 years the respect has gone down drastically. Its not that they have started taking the flesh. But worse than that.

read the next post "COWS ... Are Hindus really concerned?"