How to ‘clean' city's drains? Roadmap for 10 govt bodies

Cell Submits 1st Report After Considering CPCB Suggestions

New Delhi: The Integrated Drain Management Cell (IDMC), a body set up on the directive of National Green Tribunal for remediation and management of drains in Delhi, has issued its first report with detailed plans for the city’s civic agencies. The directions have considered suggestions made by Central Pollution Control Board on the agencies making use of alternative technologies for drains such as phytoremediation, constructed wetlands, microbials, bioremediation, waste stabilisation ponds and mechanically aerated lagoons.

Of the 10 agencies that oversee Delhi’s drains system, by far the largest is public works department with over 2,000km of drains under its jurisdiction. PWD informed IDMC that an IIT-Delhi or Delhi Technological University consultant was being hired for its plans to construct a bioremediation plant at Chhatarpur and Chhatrasal Stadium by December. These plants will have the capacity, respectively, to process 2.5 and up to 1.5 million litres daily.

The irrigation and flood control department has the second biggest responsibility with 427km of drains. It said its analyses found bioremediation and phytoremediation unfeasible and so has reappointed NEERI to explore the alternatives.

New Delhi Municipal Council is already carrying out bioremediation in the 6.5-km Kushak drain and did not require action plans for its other drains. DDA, meanwhile, is constructing nine wetlands to handle the nine drains between DND Flyway and Dhobi ghat. These are likely to be completed by October. It also intimated IDMC of the construction of four sewage treatment plants with the capacity to cumulatively process 26.5 MLD.