The IITians for Holy Ganga, a forum constituted to preserve heritage and ecology of the Ganga river by alumni of all IITs across the country has expressed deep shock and disbelief at the demise of Swamy Gyan Swaroop Sanand who was formerly a professor at IIT.

In a statement issued to the media, the forum stated that on several occasions, he had written and appealed to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Water Resources Minister Nitin Gadkari to immediately issue orders to suspend  work on all on going Hydro Electric Power (HEP) and tunnelling projects in Uttarakhand and implement recommendations made by IIT consortium of River Ganga basin to allow Ganga to flow in natural form.

“Swami Gyan Swaroop was earlier a Professor at IIT Kanpur. The PhD holder in environmental engineering from the University of California at Berkeley had also served as a Member-Secretary of the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB).

An environmental activist for decades, he formally became a swami in 2011 at the age of 79 years. Even before that he had undertaken a number of fasts for environmental causes, the most notable being the 2009 fast demanding to stop the construction of dams on the Bhagirathi River,” said president of IITians for Holy Ganga president Yatinder Pal Singh Suri.

“We, the IITians, urge Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Water Resources Minister Nitin Gadkari to intervene and accede to three major demands of late swami including stopping of work on Vishnugad Pipalkoti, Singoli Bhawari and Phata Byung Hydro electric projects, passing of the draft Ganga protection act drafted by Girdhar Malviya headed committee in Parliament and creation of a National Ganga follower committee whose permission will be necessary before taking any decision about Ganga,” said Suri.