Recently, a youngster who came to collect donations for the festival proudly told me the 'area boys' were bringing a Ganesha idol costing Rs 5 lakh from Hyderabad. Although I wanted to tell him we could plant 500 saplings with that money, I instead asked mildly, "Who gave you the funds?"
He responded, "Namma leader sir!" The 'leader' could have been anybody, the local corporator, MLA, MP or even their supporter. As long as there is easy funding for huge idols in pandals it will be impossible to put a cap on the painted kind.
The awareness must begin with these political leaders, who encourage the use of painted idols. Our lakes are saturated with toxic material and the entire ecosystem is dying because of it.
Every year, the BBMP and LDA officials try to curb immersion of the idols in lakes, but like I said, they only try. Some rowdy elements in the name of political leaders always get away by immersing the painted idols in lakes.
The alarming levels of contaminants left by them are overlooked by the politicians. If there is a cap on the size of idols that can be placed in pandals and if politicians stop funding the bigger ones, we could see things begin to change in the right direction.
The writer is a former state environment secretary and a green crusader
