New Delhi, October 22: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Thursday attended the inauguration and foundation-stone laying of Yamuna rejuvenation projects worth ₹8,941 crore in Delhi, and said the river would be cleaned before May 2029.
Ten projects were inaugurated and work began on 33 others. They include the upgrading of existing sewage treatment plants (STPs), new STPs, a decentralised STP pumping station and work to connect homes to sewer lines. Sewer rehabilitation, tapping and drainage work is also under way, Shah said. Delhi Lieutenant Governor Taranjit Singh Sandhu and Chief Minister Rekha Gupta were present.
Three-state roadmap
Shah said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had set out a plan to make the Yamuna pollution-free soon after the present Delhi government took office, and that more than 40 per cent of the work under that plan had been completed. Governments at the Centre and in Delhi, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have jointly prepared time-bound roadmaps for the three states, he said.
He blamed earlier governments for letting Delhi’s sewage flow into the river for 30 years and for allowing about 2,000 tonnes of cow dung from dairies to be dumped into it every day. He said industrial waste water from Haryana and dirty water from Uttar Pradesh had also reached the Yamuna in the past.
Landfills and sewer connections
According to the minister, the Delhi government has cleared 2.17 crore metric tonnes of waste with help from the Centre and freed 100 acres of land. The landfills at Okhla and Bhalswa have come down by 30 to 40 metres and the one at Ghazipur by 10 to 15 metres, he said, adding that gardens would replace them within two years.
He mentioned riverfront works at Asita East, Bansera and Vasudev Ghat at Sarai Kale Khan and ITO, and said a three-year action plan had been drawn up to give every household in Delhi a sewerage connection and supply clean drinking water to every home.
In the political part of his speech, Shah criticised opposition parties over their complaints about EVMs and “vote theft”, and repeated his target of ending the drug trade in Punjab by 2029.
Related: Amit Shah sets December 2029 target to free Punjab of drug trade