The Lieutenant Governor inspected the Wazirabad water purification plant.
The Lieutenant Governor inspected the Wazirabad water purification plant.
New Delhi: Lieutenant Governor Vinay Kumar Saxena has written a letter to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal expressing his displeasure over the non-cleaning of the Wazirabad water treatment plant, which supplies water to nearly one-third of Delhi’s population. In the letter, he wrote that I had gone to inspect the Wazirabad plant on March 9, 2023. The officials there said that the plant was cleaned on June 30, 2018, since then no cleaning has been done till date.
According to the Lieutenant Governor, the Wazirabad Barrage has a reservoir of 250 million gallon capacity. Due to siltation, the water storage capacity has reduced by about 93 percent to just 16 million gallons. The state of cleanliness is that after June 30, 2018, the silt has not been cleaned in this reservoir. In the year 2013, the Jal Board appointed a contractor to clean the silt. Then 7.79 cum of silt was to be removed in eight months. 6.15 cum of silt was removed in two phases. Because of this, the depth of the reservoir decreased from 4.26 meters to just 0.42 metres. Because of this, is Delhi ready to bear the loss of nine lakh 12 thousand 500 million gallons of water.
The Lieutenant Governor wrote that the Jal Board had told the water level of the Yamuna to be low during Holi recently. He asked why the reservoir was not properly de-silted in the last eight years, due to which the condition of cleanliness was pathetic. The Lieutenant Governor has directed the Delhi government to immediately get the reservoir of the water treatment plant cleaned and de-silted.
It is written in the letter that the plant’s equipment is rusted and full of garbage. Liquor bottles, cigarette packets, etc. are filled in the tank meant for storage of waste generated during water purification. There is also rust and stains in the chamber made for water supply after purification. It has been said in the letter that with a sense of deep pain, he demands immediate intervention of the Chief Minister in this matter. He has criminalized the negligence in cleaning the water treatment plant and reservoir and has also recommended strict action against the officials responsible for it.
