SHIMLA: Under the impact of global warming, about 30 metres of Gangotri glacier and five km of Khumbu glacier have shrunk while the temperature in Himachal Pradesh has gone up by one degree Celsius since 1970, the state Environment Minister said on Friday. 

Launching a special green drive, which will focus on checking misuse of electricity, water and vehicular fuel, Environment and Forests Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda said research shows that temperature in the state rose by a degree in the last four decades. 

"Shimla is moving out of snow-line as snowfall has come down in the famous tourist resort," he warned. 

The Minister said the Khumbu glacier, through which Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary scaled the Everest, has shrunk by about five km. 

The Gangotri glacier, which feeds the river Ganga, has melted by 30 metres, he said. 

The drive, 'Sensitisation on Environment Auditing', was launched to create awareness in government departments on checking misuse of power, water and vehicular fuel. 

Besides drying up of water bodies, rise in temperature has caused decline in yield of wheat and apple, Nadda said. 

About annual power consumption in state secretariat, he said about 88 per cent of 13,49,960 KW are used for heating purposes. The Environment Department will circulate a list of do's and don'ts to all departments to check misuse of power. 

In yet another energy-saving measure, normal bulbs will be replaced with Compact Fluorescent Lights (CFL) in all government offices and under ' Atal Bijli Bachat Yojana ' four CFL bulbs each will be distributed to about 16 lakh households in the state, the Minister said.

According to the Yoga Guru the Ganga is lifeline of the population of plane regions, but its water is so polluted that in the long run it will become death line for the same population. Since Baba Ramdev has the international following if he raises this issue jointly with the VHP, the movement for the purification of the Ganga will be as successful as the Ramjanmabhoomi movement. The VHP has chalked out a plan for the movement. It will hold a meeting at Patanjali Yoga Peeth, Haridwar, in third week of June. The meeting will be attended by Shri Ashok Singhal, Shankaracharya of Jyotish Peeth Swami Vasudevanand Saraswati, Sadhvi Ritambhara, Swami Chinmayanand and Swami Hansdas Maharaj. The Haridwar meet will provide basic ground for the future movement for the cause of the Ganga. After that meet, VHP will meet in Kanpur for further planning from June 25 to June 30. 

The lifeline of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal, the Ganga is suffering from acute pollution, especially in the plane regions. Even its origin, Gangotri, also has got polluted to some extent. For its purification, the Ganga Action Plan was started 23 years ago in 1985. The first phase was to be completed within 6-7 years but red tapism and corrupt system have been the main hurdles in the path of the purification of the Ganga. The first phase was not completed even by 2004, and in between, the second phase was started in 1993. In this phase, purification of the Yamuna, the Gomati and the Damodar was also the part of the plan. The second phase was to be completed by 2000 but that did not complete. Now the compliance period of the Ganga Action Plan is 2008 but now it seems that it shall not be completed within this period. The Ganga, especially in Kanpur, Allahabad and Varanasi is highly polluted. By the way, these are the religious places of Hindus. Bithoor in Kanpur is a teerthsthal for Hindus but the water is neither suitable for drinking nor for taking a bath in the Ganga. Jajmau of Kanpur, where so many leather factories are situated, is the main cause of this pollution. The same position prevails in Allahabad and Varanasi. In Allahabad Rs 60 crore have been spent in the two phases but in vain. In Varanasi, from where the Ganga Action Plan was started, the Ganga is in very miserable condition. Crores of rupees have been spent but without any result.