{"id":16349,"date":"2019-03-15T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-03-15T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/2019\/03\/15\/discarded-hindu-religious-statues-at-auckland-beaches-raise-concern\/"},"modified":"2019-03-15T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-03-15T12:00:00","slug":"discarded-hindu-religious-statues-at-auckland-beaches-raise-concern","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/2019\/03\/15\/discarded-hindu-religious-statues-at-auckland-beaches-raise-concern\/","title":{"rendered":"Discarded Hindu Religious Statues at Auckland Beaches Raise Concern"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/nz\/news\/article.cfm?c_id=1&#038;objectid=12210746\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/resizer\/nMMGZ0_nAZj1PC1OwBZvX7RCkK8=\/620x349\/smart\/filters:quality(70)\/arc-anglerfish-syd-prod-nzme.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/7VL3K2VMOVEHFH7DSTVQDEDO6Y.jpg\" style=\"max-width:100%;object-fit:scale-down;\" \/><br \/>NEW ZEALAND, March 11, 2019 (NZ Herald): Statues of Hindu Gods, Goddesses and Deities are being discarded at Auckland beaches as part of a religious practice &#8211; but concerns are being raised about it posing a risk to beachgoers and wildlife. An Auckland mother who has been cleaning beaches from Okahu Bay to Glendowie says she has been picking up statues and shards of broken pieces &#8211; mostly at Biddicks Bay and Mission Bay. Auckland beaches are already facing a dangerous litter problem with broken glass, syringes and dumped asbestos among the rubbish picked up. AUT University Professor of Diversity Edwina Pio said usually after a religious festival or celebration, such as Vinayaka Chaturthi which celebrates the birth of Hindu Deity Ganesha, statues were &#8220;released&#8221; into the sea or lakes. <\/p>\n<p>Pio said the practice among Hindus originated with clay statues painted with vegetable dyes, but many statue makers now used non-biodegradable material like plaster of paris, paints and dyes which are not soluble and can cause harm to the environment. &#8220;Casting away statues is also a stark call for religious leaders, communities, local and government bodies to quicken the pace of framing appropriate guidelines,&#8221; Pio added. An Auckland Council spokeswoman said it was working with the Hindu Council to develop recommendations on how statues and cultural offerings could be immersed in an eco-friendly manner. Hinduism is the second largest and the fastest growing religion in New Zealand, with more than 90,000 followers according to the 2013 Census.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Source NEW ZEALAND, March 11, 2019 (NZ Herald): Statues of Hindu Gods, Goddesses and Deities are being discarded at Auckland,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16349\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hinduismtoday.com\/hpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}