Now foreign consultant to clean Yamuna

Amitabh Shukla

New Delhi, May 24

After having spent close to Rs 1500 crore on cleaning the river Yamuna over a span of ten years, the government has now decided to appoint a foreign consultant for the cleaning up job.

In a meeting to discuss the affidavit to be filed in the Supreme Court for the "Maili Yamuna" case, officials of the Union Urban Development Ministry proposed the floating of global tenders for the appointment of a consultant who would guide the government on cleaning the river. "Several foreign countries have managed to cleanse their river system and we need to seek their expertise," said a senior UD officer justifying the decision.

CM Sheila Dikshit, UD Secretary Anil Baijal, Delhi UD Minister A.K. Walia, Industry Minister M.R. Singhal, DJB CEO Rakesh Mohan and other senior officers were present in the meeting. Sources said that the global consultant would be entrusted with the work of suggesting how to prevent sewage from entering the river.

The river is the lifeline of the city but has been relegated into the city's backyard and dumping ground for waste. Noted environmentalist Suneeta Narain has said that the officials who misspent such huge amounts of money should be brought to book first. "They don't need a global consultant for cleaning the river. They just need to be serious about the job," she said. Narain had earlier this year submitted a proposal to the Delhi government on cleaning the river.

"After spending Rs 1500 crores, the bio-chemical oxygenation demand (BOD) of the 22-km river stretch passing through Delhi, has only increased," said the environmentalist. She said that the solutions are clear but pollution management has become a farce.

The CAG report too has criticised the government for misutilisation of the funds and failing to do anything worthwhile to improve the river. The stretch of the river in the Capital from Palla to Okhla cannot sustain aquatic life and is not even fit for bathing. The report clearly said that despite spending crores, the situation has only worsened over the years.

BOX:

-Delhi produces 719 million gallon per day (MGD) of domestic sewage but the government has built a capacity to treat only 512MGD.

-Only 335 MGD out of the 719 MGD is being treated before discharge into the river. 384 MGD falls in the river untreated.

-The BOD is within the norms at Palla but reaches 13 times in excess of the norm at Okhla. The dissolved oxygen deteriorates from an acceptable one and a half times above the stipulated minimum norm at Palla to almost nil at Okhla. Similarly, Coli form count is 217 times at Palla but rises exponentially to about 1.39lakh times above the stipulated norm at Okhla. (2005)