The Ganges is a major river in the Indian subcontinent flowing east through the immeasurable plains of northern India into Bangladesh. The 2,510 km or 1,557 mi river originates at the Gangotri Glacier in the Indian state of Uttarakhand, in the central Himalayas, and empties into the Bay of Bengal through its vast delta in the Sunderbans. It has enjoyed a state of admiration among India`s Hindus, by whom it is worshipped in its incarnated form as the goddess Ganga. The river Ganges flows through India, Nepal and Bangladesh. The major cities along the River Ganges are Haridwar, Moradabad, Rampur, Allahabad, Kanpur, Patna, Varanasi and Rajshahi. The Ganges Delta is at the Bay of Bengal, Bangladesh.

During the early Vedic Ages, the Indus and the Saraswati River were the chief rivers, not the Ganges. But later , the three Vedas seem to give much more significance to the Ganges, as shown by its plentiful references.

Possibly the first Westerner to mention the name of Ganges was Megasthenese. He did so many times in his work Indika. The sentence was - "India, again, possesses many rivers both large and navigable, which, having their sources in the mountains which stretch along the northern frontier, traverse the level country, and not a few of these, after uniting with each other, fall into the river called the Ganges. Now this river, which at its source is 30 stadia broad, flows from north to south, and empties its waters into the ocean forming the eastern boundary of the Gangaridai, a nation which possesses a vast force of the largest-sized elephants." (Diodorus chapter II.37.)

In Rome`s Piazza Navona, a famous sculpture, Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi or the fountain of the four rivers was designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini and was built in 1651. This sculpture symbolizes four of the world`s great river, amongst which the Ganges is one of them and the rivers represented the four continents known at the time. Major tributaries on the left bank of Ganges are Mahakhali, Karnali, Kosi, Gandak, Ghaghra and the tributaries in the right bank are Yamuna, Son, Mahananda.

The Ganges and its tributaries drain an enormous area about one million square kilometers. The waters of Ganges drain the fertile basin and supports one of the world`s highest-density human populations. Almost half of the population of India lives on one-third of the landscape within 500 km of the Himalayan range along the Gangetic plains and depends on the River Ganges.