Pune: To promote eco-friendly immersion of Ganesh idols, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) will distribute sodium bicarbonate free of cost to citizens this year also.

The PMC has decided to procure sodium bicarbonate from Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilisers for eco-friendly immersion. The PMC has been promoting this environment-friendly technique in which the citizens need to just mix sodium bicarbonate in the water before immersing Ganesh idols made of Plaster of Paris (PoP) for its scientific disposal. The chemical will be distributed to citizens at various designated points during the festival.

The environment-friendly initiative was kicked off a few years ago after Cummins India in association with National Chemical Laboratory (NCL) introduced this technique to dissolve PoP. According to an estimate, there are around five lakh Ganesh idols installed in homes and in the Ganesh mandals and most of the idols are immersed in the rivers, canals, wells and other natural water bodies like Katraj lake.

As the immersion of PoP made Ganesh idols in natural water bodies resulted in pollution, the PMC decided to promote eco-friendly immersion. The PMC will mix sodium bicarbonate in artificial tanks made available at various immersion ghats for faster dissolution of PoP. The process of dissolution of PoP Ganesh idols takes a few hours.