NEW DELHI: The Delhi state government will launch a campaign to clean Yamuna from Friday. The entire administration will spend two hours every day during this three-day campaign to clean the river.

The six-member state cabinet would lead elected representatives, resident welfare associations, voluntary organisations, school students and corporate groups to clean the river from seven different points on the eastern and western bank of the river.

Interestingly, in a similar effort last year the state government had spent about 10 hours cleaning the river. It had then claimed to have cleared 200 truckloads of garbage and cleaned 3.5 kilometre stretch of the Yamuna.

But having dug out the garbage from the river, the dumps were left behind. With the first rainfall after the campaign, the garbage was back into the river.

This year the state government claims to be having better coordination with the civic bodies, to clear the slush and garbage that would be taken out of the river during the drive. Like last year, this year too the state ministers have been given charge of seven points between Wazirabad bridge and ITO along the river.

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CHENNAI, May 30. Political parties have gone in for plastic flags and festoons as part of campaigning for the May 31 byelections despite the Government move to ban the use of non-reusable plastics.

Be it the ruling party or the Opposition, they have decked the streets of Saidapet with synthetic flags.

With the campaign ending on Wednesday, authorities got busy `cleaning' the streets.

The flags were brought down this morning creating a huge mess in many streets of Saidapet.

Some NGOs were wondering why the Election Commission and the Pollution Control Board are have not taken up this issue with political parties.

``Are politicians alone exempted from pollution control rules and norms,'' asks an environmental activist.

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