Forest dept. wants to create stream at point of origin

Efforts have been redoubled by the Forest Department of Haryana government to bring the mythical Saraswati river to the surface by creating a stream at its point of origin at Saraswati Udgam Sthal in the Adi Badri area of Yamunanagar district.

A team of officials of the Forest Department has made trips to the Udgam Sthal and surrounding areas to find ways and means of creating a water channel that would seek to retrace the path of the mystical river which finds prominent mention in Hindu scriptures and is believed to have flowed all the way up to Allahabad where its confluence with the Ganga and Yamuna imparted the name of Triveni to the place.

The Saraswati Udgam Sthal on the foothills of the Shivaliks was created in Adi Badri as it is believed that it was here that the Saraswati originated. According to information from the Haryana Tourism department, the place provides traces of the descent of the river from the Shivalik hills to the plains of Haryana.

An official of the Forest Department, Randhir Kumar, said that as part of the plan to create a stream, water would be collected from a number of sources in and around the Udgam Sthal.

“We will take the water from the stream that originates here, the water from a drain which flows nearby and from two-three tubewells that would be sunk at spots along the route of the ancient river.”

According to Hindu mythology, an underground stream of Saraswati still flows. It has also been claimed in the past that satellite imagery had proved the existence of an underground stream along the routes of the Saraswati.

For getting the river on the ground, the BJP government in Haryana has also taken the help of a laboratory in Dehradun. The creation of a water channel is also expected to boost religious tourism in the area.