Why We Still Throw Ganesha Into the River and Sea — And What It's Really Costing Us

 

I still remember standing on the riverbank as a kid, watching the crowd carry Ganesha on their shoulders, drums beating, colours flying in the air, everyone shouting "Ganpati Bappa Morya!" It felt magical. It felt like joy itself had a shape.

But years later, I went back to that same riverbank — not during the festival, but a few weeks after. And what I saw broke something in me.

Broken arms. Faded paint peeling off like dead skin. A trunk floating alone, separated from the body. The water that once sparkled now looked tired, thick, almost ashamed.

That's when I asked myself a question I never had the courage to ask as a child: do we really need to keep doing this? And if we do, at what cost?

This article is not against faith. It's not against tradition. It's a simple, honest look — as a normal person, not a scientist, not an activist — at what happens after the drums stop and the crowd goes home.

The Tradition Behind Ganesha Visarjan

For those who don't know, Ganesha Chaturthi is one of the most loved festivals in India and among Tamil and Hindu communities across the world. Lord Ganesha, the remover of obstacles, is welcomed into homes and public pandals for a few days, worshipped with devotion, and then immersed in water — a river, lake, or the sea — symbolising his journey back to his heavenly abode.

The belief is beautiful in its own way: everything that comes from nature must return to nature. Clay to water. Form to formlessness. It's a lesson in letting go.

The problem isn't the belief. The problem is what the statue is actually made of today, and where it actually ends up.

What's Really Inside the Statue We Immerse

Fifty years ago, most Ganesha idols were made from natural river clay, mixed with a bit of straw, and painted with vegetable dyes. When you immersed that idol, it genuinely dissolved back into the earth, exactly like the tradition intended.

Today, that's rarely the case.

Most idols sold in the market are made from Plaster of Paris (POP) because it's cheap, easy to mould into detailed designs, and dries fast. The bright colours we all love — the deep blues, shiny golds, glossy reds — usually come from synthetic, chemical-based paints, some of which contain heavy metals.

Here's the hard truth: POP does not dissolve the way natural clay does. It can take months, sometimes years, to break down. And while it sits there, the chemicals inside it slowly leak into the water.

The Hazards Nobody Talks About at the Festival

1. Water Pollution That Outlasts the Celebration

When thousands of idols go into the same river or coastline within a few days, the water quality drops fast. Heavy metals like lead, mercury, and chromium from the paint seep into the water. Oxygen levels fall. The water turns cloudy, sometimes smells different for weeks.

2. Fish and Aquatic Life Pay the Price

Fish don't celebrate the festival, but they suffer for it. Chemical residue and reduced oxygen levels can kill fish, disturb breeding cycles, and damage the smaller organisms that keep the whole water ecosystem alive. Many rivers report visible fish deaths in the days right after major immersion events.

3. Drinking Water Sources at Risk

In several cities, the same rivers used for immersion are also, further downstream, a source of drinking water or irrigation for farmland. Contaminated water doesn't just disappear — it moves, it gets absorbed, it eventually comes back to us, on our plates and in our taps.

4. Non-Biodegradable Waste Left Behind

Along with the idol, we often throw in plastic decorations, thermocol (styrofoam) bases, garlands, and packaging. Volunteers and civic workers spend days after the festival pulling this debris out of the water, and a lot of it is never fully recovered.

5. Physical Injuries and Crowd Risks

This is the part we rarely mention. Every year, immersion processions involve huge crowds, heavy idols, deep water, and sometimes strong waves near the coast. People have drowned trying to carry idols too far into the water. Trucks carrying massive statues have met with accidents on the way to the immersion site. The emotional high of the festival can sometimes make people ignore basic safety.

6. The Economic and Social Cost

Cleaning up a river or beach after immersion season isn't free. Local governments spend real money — money that comes from taxes — deploying cranes, workers, and boats to remove idol debris. That's public money that could go toward schools, hospitals, or clean water projects, being spent instead on cleaning up something that could have been prevented in the first place.

It's Not About Stopping Faith — It's About Growing With It

I want to be very clear here, because I know this topic touches something deep for many of us. This is not me telling anyone to stop believing, stop celebrating, or stop honouring Ganesha.

Tradition is not supposed to be frozen in time. Our ancestors adapted their practices based on what was available and sustainable in their era. We can do the same, without losing an ounce of devotion.

Some simple shifts already happening in many communities:

• Natural clay idols instead of Plaster of Paris
• Eco-friendly, water-based paints instead of chemical ones
• Symbolic immersion in a bucket or tub at home, with the water later used for plants
• Community immersion tanks set up by local authorities, where idols are collected and dissolved safely away from natural water bodies
• Idol return schemes, where clay idols are collected after "immersion" in an artificial tank and reused as raw material for the next year's idols

None of these reduce the devotion. If anything, they add a new layer of meaning: protecting the same nature that Ganesha, remover of obstacles, is supposed to help us live in harmony with.

A Quiet Thought to End With

Every year, we ask Ganesha to remove obstacles from our lives. But maybe this year, we can also ask ourselves an honest question: are we quietly creating obstacles for the rivers, the sea, the fish, and the future generations who will inherit this water?

Faith and responsibility were never meant to be opposites. We can hold both hands at once — one raised in prayer, and the other doing the small, practical work of protecting the planet that carries our prayers away.

That, to me, feels like true devotion.

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If this made you pause and think, share it with someone in your family who still buys the idol every year without a second thought. Sometimes a small conversation is where real change begins.