Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose government has given top priority to cleansing the Ganga, would chair the fifth meeting of National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) Thursday.

The Prime Minister is the the ex-officio Chairman of the Authority while Chief Ministers of Bihar, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand are its members.

The meeting comes at a time when BJP-led NDA government at Centre has given thrust on cleaning up the polluted river and charting out plans for it.

The previous meeting was held on October 27 last year, which was chaired by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti.

Constituted in 2009, NGRBA is as an empowered planning, financing, monitoring and coordinating authority for river Ganga.

The objective of the Authority is to ensure effective abatement of pollution and conservation of the river Ganga by adopting a holistic approach with the river basin as the unit of planning.

The functions of the Authority include all measures necessary for planning and execution of programmes for abatement of pollution in the Ganga in keeping with sustainable development needs.

NGRBA, which was functioning under the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, was transferred to the Ministry of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation in 2014.

This paved the way for the Ministry of Water Resources to look after all issues related to conservation, development management and abatement of pollution in river Ganga and its tributaries.

- Manohar