Recently, newspapers reported that a plea to the National Green Tribunal sought to stop the construction of the 70-storey Chandrodaya Temple in Vrindavan. The temple, being constructed by ISKCON, would apparently “amplify the pride of Vrindavan” according to the organisation’s Vice Chairman.
The National Green Tribunal, before delivering its final verdict, must consider the fact that we are sitting on a time bomb called ‘ecological imbalance’. Much irreversible harm to the environment has already been made in the name of urbanisation, industrialisation, road connectivity and so on. Trees have been mercilessly destroyed. Soil erosion, water depletion, floods, famines, greenhouse effect, ozone depletion and many more natural calamities are the crops that mankind is reaping because of deforestation. Sooner or later, such activities, if allowed to propagate, will lead to the end of Indian civilisation.
The finances spent on making the temple could be put to more sensible and sensitive use like booting away superstition that is becoming an incurable cause of ‘mass suicide’, increasing employment avenues, providing better education to more people, and improving the pathetic state of government schools across the country.
Isn’t it weird that the political fraternity is favouring the construction of such buildings in a country where a large part of its population lives below the poverty line?
The same finances could have been utilised to tackle the drug menace that has gripped the nation.
There are innumerable places of tourist attraction that are in desperate need of attention and treatment. The Taj Mahal in Agra, Banasur ka Qila in Lohaghat, the ailing Yamuna, the withering Ganga and many more rivers are heading towards their death. All these can be revived by carefully utilising funds.
The last but the most important point I want to raise here is that the slope of the graph of ‘Indian Pride’ shall only turn upwards when India will disappear from its number one rank in the list of the 10 most dangerous countries for women across the world, and not by constructing multi-storeyed buildings of cement and mortar.