Delhi Budget: 6-point plan to clean Yamuna amid proposal to expand sewer network
According to the government’s plan, over the next year there will be a 41% rise in Delhi’s sewage treatment capacity from the existing 632MGD to 890MGD, and 570 new unauthorised colonies will be added to sewage network.
The Delhi government has incorporated a “six-point action plan to clean Yamuna” into its comprehensive plan to transform Delhi into a “clean, beautiful and modern city” as part of the Budget proposal for 2023-24, state finance minister Kailash Gahlot said during his address Wednesday.
Gahlot said that in the next year, the government will rapidly expand the reach of sewer network towards all unauthorised colonies and jhuggi-jhopdi (JJ) clusters and upgrade the Capital’s sewage treatment plants on a war footing to achieve its vision of a clean Yamuna. According to water experts, the high pollution levels in the river are due to dumping of untreated sewage,outfall of industrial effluents while other contributory factors include dumping of waste, dairies and dhobi ghats as well as use of chemical fertilizers in the cultivation along floodplains.
According to the government’s plan, over the next year there will be a 41% rise in Delhi’s sewage treatment capacity from the existing 632MGD to 890MGD, and 570 new unauthorised colonies will be added to sewage network, Currently 747 of the 1,799 unauthorised colonies are connected to the network.
To be sure, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal had announced the six-point action plan on November 18, 2021, to clean the river by February 2025. The plan comprises the construction and upgradation of STPs, 100% sewer connectivity, de-silting of the sewer network, trapping drains from JJ clusters, controlling industrial pollutants and diverting polluting drains and sub-drains.
The minister called the Yamuna Delhi’s lifeline and said any vision to develop the Capital must put the rejuvenation of the river at the forefront. “Building on the multiple efforts initiated in the last eight years, we are working on a six-point action plan, which includes construction of new STPs/DSTPs,” he added. The government has announced that the sewage treatment capacity of the city will be significantly increased by 258MGD (million gallons per day) over the next 12 months from the existing 632MGD to 890MGD by the end of March 2024 --a 41% rise in capacity in a single year. The Economic Survey of Delhi released on Monday said that existing STPs are “not functioning up to their optimum level” and are treating only 560MGD of sewage against the 784MGD generated.
Under the Yamuna cleaning programme, the government also plans to increase the sewer connectivity up to 100% households via the chief minister’s Free Sewer Connection Scheme. “We are providing free household sewer connections to the people in unauthorised colonies. Sewer networks will be set up in 570 unauthorised colonies in the next year,” Gahlot said. Currently, only 747 (41%) unauthorised colonies are connected to the network, which will rise to 1,317 colonies (73%). Of the 1,799 unauthorised colonies in the Capital, only 227 were connected to the network till 2014. Dumping of sewage from these areas is a major source of pollution in the river. According to Delhi Jal Board data, the 1,799 unauthorised colonies comprise around 1,618,080 houses, of which only 340,720 units are connected to the sewer lines.
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The proposal also incorporates the desilting of 90km trunk and peripheral sewer lines. According to the status report submitted to the high-level Yamuna cleaning committee headed by the LG on March 14, DJB has so far desilted 21.9km of trunk sewer lines, of which only 6.74km of trunk lines were cleaned over the last one month. The agency has been tasked to clear 90km of trunk lines by June and the slow progress has been flagged by the committee. DJB has also been tasked to trap and divert drains from JJ clusters and connect them to the main sewer network, as well as trap the sub-drains of three major drains-- Najafgarh drain, Supplementary drain and Shahdara drain. Gahlot claimed that the due to the combined impact of the six-point action plan to clean Yamuna, the quantity of sewage being treated in Delhi will increase drastically from 373MGD in 2015 to nearly 890MGD by March 2024 -- an increase of nearly 250% in just eight years.
The Yamuna enters Delhi near Palla and travels about 48km through the city. The 22km stretch between Wazirabad tand Okhla is the most polluted stretch--2% of the overall river length contributes to 70% of total pollution in Yamuna. Since the launch of Yamuna Action Plan in 1993, several projects have been initiated to clean the Yamuna and political parties have made several promises, but the river stretch still resembles a sewage canal.