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ghat: The Latest Architecture and News

Varanasi's Ghats: The Adaptable Riverscapes of India

Water, with its religious connotations as a symbol of purification and life, holds great significance in many cultures. Nowhere is this respect for water more evident than in India, a country that reveres its rivers as holy. Water bodies serve as a testament to the veneration and use of water in religious rituals, embodying cultural heritage as public spaces, ritual sites, and places for cremation. Central to daily life in India, water and water architecture intertwine spirituality, and cultural traditions, offering a glimpse into the rich traditions of communities.

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Massive River Development Plan Hopes to Rejuvenate India's Relationship to the Ganges

Delhi-based firm Morphogenesis has recently unveiled a proposal for a project that will rehabilitate and develop the ghats (a flight of steps leading down to a river) and crematoriums along a 210-kilometer stretch of the Ganges, India’s longest river. The project, titled “A River in Need,” is part of the larger National Mission of Clean Ganga (NMCG), an undertaking of the Indian Government’s Ministry of Water Resources which was formed in 2011 with twin objectives: to ensure effective abatement of the river’s pollution and to conserve and rejuvenate it.

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