On the relationship between waterbodies and us

This past week I was in Hyderabad attending a conference.  Our hotel was opposite the Hussain Sagar Lake.  The driver told me that the lake was visible from the hotel rooms and I was lucky enough to get a room that faced the lake.  At the conference, one of the members told us that the government had created a nice walk around the lake.

So on the last day of the conference, I went out at 6.30 am for a walk.  The lake itself is lovely filled with water.  Common Coots were having a swim.  Nice and wonderful.  But...
The thing that hit me most was the stench that reminded me of Cooum river in Chennai.  My uncle used to have an apartment overlooking the river and everyday we were reminded of the river, thanks to the stench.
The lakefront had boards put by Hyderabad Municipal proclaiming the need to keep the lake clean but garbage (plastic bags) was strewn around the edge.

The lake front garden was small and unimaginatively built. Four stray puppies were gamboling.  There were no women.  The entire park had been taken over by men.  I had a quick walk and then turned back to the hotel chased all the way by the smell.
Which brings me to our relationship with water bodies. At this point there are no water bodies in India (maybe excluding Indore and Bhopal?) that is not highly polluted.  Garbage is one menace but the greater threat is untreated sewage and chemical waste that is dumped into the water bodies without a care. So while each of our river is worshiped, each of them too turn into a dumping ground for all waste.  None of the stakeholder is serious about cleaning up the water bodies- panels and measures are regularly announced but...

Standardized online entrance exam and biometric attendance for teachers

Now teacher attendance is mandatory. As usual I do not understand either of the two decisions.  What is this going to accomplish?  Will it force the non-performers to teach and do research? All it will do is that once a day they will make a trip to their center and sign in.  Big deal.  It will waste little bit of petrol but if it satisfies the powers, what can one say?
The other issue is even more mind-boggling.  Apparently, our exam is going to be now conducted in multiple choice questions. How do you evaluate a language or a social science student  or a international relations who is applying for Ph.D in multiple choice format? How do you evaluate their ability to make an argument and defend it in multiple choice format?  In sciences itself, where it is easy to design questions in this format, we struggle with the kind of students we get. Most often they possess absolutely no communication skills, many of them do rote-learning, many of them do guesswork, and when they join the program it becomes an uphill task to make them read, think and ask questions.  But in social sciences or languages...I give up!
As usual there will be no debate on this issue. It has been decided by the administration so we just have to follow it.
Ugh!