Pune’s Mula-Mutha river system is being treated by a growing local movement as more than a polluted water channel. The World Rivers Day programme led by Jeevitnadi Living River Foundation brought students, volunteers and residents to riverbanks and confluence points, combining heritage walks with conservation work. The larger significance of the programme lies in its attempt to change how an urban river is understood: not as a linear drainage or water conveyance system, but as an ecosystem whose health is connected to groundwater, wetlands, biodiversity, public behaviour and the city’s own history.
That shift matters because the river has been part of Pune’s physical growth, yet public engagement with it can often remain episodic. A clean-up drive may remove visible waste for a day, while the ecological processes that sustain a river stretch remain less visible. Jeevitnadi’s activities, as described by its representatives, seek to build a more continuous relationship between people and particular sections of the river. The approach combines observation, documentation, water-quality monitoring, biodiversity mapping and restoration work rather than limiting participation to the removal of waste.
The foundation’s World Rivers Day programme used several locations to connect the river’s history with its present condition. A heritage walk at Siddheshwar Ghat examined the origin and age of the river and the way the Mula-Mutha shaped Pune’s growth. Parallel walks took place at the Ram-Mula confluence and Vitthalwadi, where experts and volunteers discussed the river’s history, ecology and current challenges. The locations matter because they allow participants to see the river as a connected system while also recognising that different stretches have distinct ecological and social conditions.
Shailaja Deshpande, founder-director of Jeevitnadi, said the purpose was to help people understand the river as an ecosystem rather than simply as a water channel. Her explanation points to an important institutional and planning question: what does the city choose to preserve when it intervenes in a river? If the river is defined only by its visible flow, interventions may focus on the channel. If it is understood as an ecosystem, attention also extends to banks, springs, wetlands, biodiversity and the communities that live around it.
The foundation’s year-long river curriculum shows how the movement is trying to create that understanding early. The programme is associated with seven city schools and has reached more than 1,500 students. Students in Classes VI to VIII attend monthly sessions, consisting of nine indoor sessions and a field visit, with each immersive session lasting two hours. The structure combines classroom learning with direct observation, allowing students to compare what existed earlier, what remains and what might be required for restoration.
This is different from treating environmental education as a one-off awareness event. According to Jeevitnadi, students work with scientific evidence and documentation and encounter the consequences of pollution during field activities. The supplied account does not establish the programme’s long-term ecological outcomes, but it does show an effort to connect learning with a specific urban landscape. That connection is significant because river conditions are experienced locally: at a ghat, a confluence, a wetland, a spring or a settlement adjoining the riverbank.
College students are also part of the programme. Shubha Kulkarni, a volunteer with Jeevitnadi, said architecture students had worked on spring boxes and methods to protect groundwater springs. Some colleges have Green Clubs, while others have River Clubs whose members take part in conservation efforts. The participation of architecture students introduces the built-environment dimension of river conservation. River restoration is not only about ecological knowledge; it also involves how buildings, public spaces, drainage systems, streets and infrastructure meet the river.
The focus on springs is particularly important within the evidence provided by the programme. At Vitthalwadi, the Adopt a Stretch initiative has helped restore a groundwater spring and create a wetland in an urban river stretch. These interventions suggest that the river system cannot be separated neatly from subsurface water or wetland habitats. A riverbank may appear to be a narrow edge between land and water, but its ecological function can include groundwater recharge, habitat and seasonal water retention. The report does not provide measurements of the restored spring or wetland, so their performance cannot be independently assessed from the available material. It does, however, identify the type of work being undertaken beyond surface-level cleaning.
The Adopt a Stretch initiative has continued for nine years, according to the foundation. Participants adopt geographically defined stretches and work there every week or fortnight. Their activities include biodiversity mapping, water-quality monitoring, groundwater-spring restoration and documenting changes to the ecosystem. This creates a more specific model of civic participation than a general call to save the river. Responsibility is attached to a defined place and repeated over time.
Deshpande said volunteers are present on different riverbanks in Pune every Saturday and Sunday morning throughout the year. On regular days, the programme draws an average of 10 to 15 citizens, while special activities can bring between 50 and 100 people. These figures do not measure the health of the Mula-Mutha, but they do indicate the scale and regularity of the participation mechanism described by the foundation. The distinction between routine attendance and special-event participation is also useful: sustained conservation requires work on ordinary days, not only during high-visibility campaigns.
The programme’s social dimension is visible in an activity at Vitthalwadi, where girls from a nearby slum settlement helped remove idols from the river. The account places local residents within the conservation process rather than presenting them only as beneficiaries or sources of pollution. At the same time, one activity cannot establish a broader pattern of inclusion. The available report does not identify how many nearby settlements participate, how such work is coordinated with municipal agencies or whether residents have a formal role in river management.
Those unanswered questions point to the limits of volunteer-led conservation. Citizen groups can observe, document and restore selected features of a river stretch, but they cannot by themselves resolve the full set of urban systems that affect river health. The report does not provide details of municipal funding, sewage treatment capacity, enforcement arrangements, land-use controls or the responsibilities of different public agencies. It therefore cannot support a conclusion about the performance of Pune’s formal river governance. What it does show is a community effort operating at the point where public understanding and ecological stewardship meet.
The Mula-Mutha’s history also gives the issue a planning dimension. The heritage walk traced how the river’s evolution shaped Pune’s growth over time. This framing places the river within the city’s development story rather than outside it. Urban expansion and river conservation are often discussed as separate subjects, although the physical growth of a city changes the pressures placed on watercourses, banks and groundwater systems. In this case, the foundation’s activities connect heritage, ecology and participation in a single programme.
The evidence supplied by the report reveals a layered model of river engagement. More than 1,500 school students have been reached through a curriculum; college students have contributed to spring protection and conservation projects; 10 to 15 citizens participate on regular days; and special activities can draw 50 to 100 people. The Adopt a Stretch initiative has continued for nine years. Together, these numbers show duration, educational reach and recurring participation. They do not establish whether pollution has declined, biodiversity has increased or water quality has improved. Those outcomes would require systematic measurements that are not included in the source material.
This distinction between participation and ecological performance is central to understanding the programme. A river movement can be successful in building public connection without yet demonstrating measurable restoration across the river system. Conversely, monitoring and restoration work can produce useful local results even when the wider river remains under pressure. The foundation’s emphasis on documentation is therefore important because it creates the possibility of tracking changes over time. The supplied report, however, does not provide a baseline or subsequent measurements against which those changes can be assessed.
The policy landscape surrounding the Mula-Mutha is similarly only partly visible in the account. The activities described involve schools, colleges, volunteers and local residents, while the foundation provides the organising structure. The report does not specify the role of Pune’s municipal administration or other authorities in the individual initiatives. This leaves an institutional question for future reporting: how are citizen observations, water-quality findings and restoration efforts connected to official river planning and enforcement?
That question matters because urban rivers are governed through multiple systems. Education, waste management, drainage, groundwater protection, land use and public-space planning can all influence the condition of a river, even when they are administered separately. Jeevitnadi’s work brings several of these connections into view, particularly through its focus on springs, wetlands, biodiversity and pollution. The account does not show whether these activities are part of a formal citywide framework, making coordination an important issue to monitor.
For Pune, the broader urban question is whether public participation can help rebuild an everyday relationship with the Mula-Mutha while formal institutions address the larger pressures on the river. Jeevitnadi’s approach suggests that conservation is more durable when people spend time at a particular stretch, learn how it functions and take responsibility for observing changes. It also shows why river restoration cannot be reduced to beautification or periodic cleaning when the stated objectives include groundwater, wetlands, biodiversity and water quality.
The evidence confirms that Pune’s river movement is developing a sustained, place-based model of engagement involving schools, colleges and citizens. It also confirms that several ecological activities are being attempted, including spring restoration, wetland creation, biodiversity mapping and water-quality monitoring. What remains unestablished in the supplied material is the measurable impact of these interventions and their relationship with official river management. Those are the developments that deserve attention as the Mula-Mutha conservation effort continues.
