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Long Drive
The Delhi
Government's campaign to clean up the Yamuna was impressive but needs
to backed up by measures that can weed out the root causes of the pollution.
INDIA TODAY's Special Correspondent Sayantan Chakravarty reports.
When Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit
said the five-day campaign to clean up the Yamuna last week was only symbolic,
she couldn't have been more right. For far too long, the Yamuna has been
carrying only slush, not hope, as it runs its silent course through the
capital. And six committees have been set up in six months — between
January and June last year — to review the issue of river pollution
with nothing coming out of them yet.
But Dikshit didn't mean it that way. What she implied was that the campaign
was just a glimpse of things to come. And should there be any doubt on
that count, she even announced the setting up of a special action group
for long-term monitoring of the Yamuna clean-up which she said would be
taken up after a long-term assessment of the issue.
To be fair, the campaign by itself was more than impressive. It showed
that in just 10 hours over the five days, 600 tonnes of garbage could
be scooped out of the Yamuna. Parts of the river which were touched upon
changed hues dramatically — from sullen black to shimmering grey
in such a short span of time. More important, people participated in large
numbers — 11,000 in all, of whom 7,500 were government employees
— to make it possible. Land on the river banks, controlled by the
Union Ministry of Urban Development, was reclaimed by the DDA and handed
over to the Delhi Government and some 20,000 trees planted in the area.
At the end of it all, A.K. Walia, Delhi's Environment Minister who will
be heading the special action group, proudly declared: "All is not
lost for the Yamuna." And his environment secretary, Sindhushree
Khullar, echoed: "The river can be rid of its immense pollution levels."
But can it really be done? The question has no easy answers. By every
indication Dikshit and Walia have a giant task on their hands. Nearly
65,000 slums with a floating population of anywhere between 3-4 lakh are
located on the river banks with most of the settlements beyond the Wazirabad
barrage. Finding nearly 300 hectares of land to relocate them won't be
easy. As of now, the Government doesn't even have a remote idea of where
they can be shifted, let alone how.
Then comes the burning issue of wastes. The untreated wastes from the
slums apart, 17 drains, including Delhi's biggest — Najafgarh, empty
into it nearly 715 million gallons per day (MLD) of sewer water generated
from the homes of the capital's 1.4 million people and 1 lakh industries.
A large part of this sewer water remains untreated. Says R.C. Trivedi,
senior scientist at the Central Pollution Control Board who monitors river
pollution: "The Yamuna is by far the most polluted river in the country.
No other river is so remorselessly deluged daily with so much of sullage
and toxic effluents by so many." The reasons for the untreated deluge
are clear. Delhi consumes about 750 millions gallons per day (MGD) of
water, 90 per cent of which (about 675 MGD) gets back into the sewer system.
Only about 350 MGD gets treated in existing sewage treatment plants (STPs)
that have a combined capacity of dealing with about 402 MGD of sewage.
Of the untreated sewage, a critical chunk — about 50 MGD — comes
from untreated industrial waste. This is the real culprit as far as riverine
life is concerned.
It has taken years of insouciance for matters to reach such a polluted
pass. It was in 1989 that the Supreme Court first issued orders for cleaning
up the Yamuna, following a public interest petition by environmental lawyer
M.C. Mehta. Subsequently, other directives were given and the Delhi Government
was asked to set up 15 additional STPs, and 16 common effluent treatment
plants (CETPs) for the capital's 28 recognised industrial estates. These
estates had nothing to check pollution — no devices, no plants. Most
of them still don't.
Only a dozen of the 15 STPs have been taken up for construction. Although
the Government claims that five of them are functional, Mehta and others
express serious doubts. Not a single CETP is ready, even Dikshit admits
as much. The Delhi Government promises to have them operational in a couple
of years but even if that happens, the total sewage treatment capacity
would go up to only 580 MGD. By then, the demand would have escalated
to nearly 850 MGD. So the untreated component of the sewage would still
be the same.
Against such a backdrop, state BJP leaders argue, that Dikshit's clean-up
drive is a farce. Says Jagdish Mukhi, MLA and leader of the Opposition
in the Delhi Assembly: "This entire thing is a drama, an eye-wash.
Three orders of the Supreme Court have been violated by this Government.
They have announced clean-up drives earlier, but have done nothing."
True the Delhi Government has made a renewed start. But the initial enthusiasm
must not give way to complacence. The crucial issues of relocating those
in the slums and setting up of the treatment plants needs to addressed
on a priority. The water flow in Yamuna has also to be improved. In London
when the authorities decided to clean up the Thames, they told themselves
that salmon would one day breed in the waters. Achieving such a high standard
of purity may be a far cry for the Delhi Government. But, surely, it can
help breed some hope in the Yamuna.
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