No trace of COVID-19 in Ganga water samples, finds study: Report

A study conducted by scientists and researchers of Council for Science and Industrial Research and Indian Institute of Toxicology Research recently submitted a 120-page report declaring that there was no trace of coronavirus in any water sample collected from river Ganga during the second wave of COVID-19 outbreak in India. The report concluded, “Of a total of 132 samples analyzed, none of the samples was found positive for the presence of SARS CoV-2 virus.” The findings of the report are singularly momentous given that a slew of journalists and western media outlets had run a smear campaign against the Yogi Adityanath government, accusing his administration of hiding COVID-related deaths after corpses were found floating in the Ganga river. Various Indian journalists such as Barkha Dutt and others belonging to the left persuasion promoted the theory that the dead bodies found in the river Ganga were COVID-19 related deaths. Congress and SP in Uttar Pradesh rejected the findings, saying everybody saw that deaths took place due to COVID-19 and those bodies who were found floating in river Ganga were of COVID-19 positive patients only. Soon enough, many western media organisations lapped up the narrative and published reports claiming that people in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar were forced to dump the dead bodies of their kin who died from COVID-19 in the river Ganga as the state administration was focused on reporting a low number of coronavirus-related deaths.