Delhi river Yamuna saw the commencement of a four-pronged strategy of cleaning, last week. The strategy has been rolled out by Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena to clean Yamuna in the next three years. The strategy employs trash skimmers, weed harvesters, and a dredge utility craft machine, according to the LG house. The decision was made final after LG Saxena met Chief Secretary Dharmendra and the additional chief Secretary of Irrigation and Flood Control (I&FC) and urged them to start work immediately.
Yamuna: A Poll Promise
River Yamuna was one of the poll promises made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the votes of Delhi during the recently concluded Delhi assembly election campaign 2025. BJP’s manifesto counts the cleaning of the river Yamuna amongst its top priorities. The BJP also promised to set up a ‘Yamuna Kosh’to revitalise the river and develop a riverfront on its bank.
After coming to power by winning 48 out of 70 seats in the February 5 elections, the BJP has started its strategic Yamuna cleaning plan.
The four-pronged strategy will involve removing the trash and silt from the river stream. Simultaneously, cleaning operations will be carried out in the Nazafgarh drain, supplementary dance and other major drains. The strategy would also involve daily monitoring of the capacity and output of the existing Sewage Treatment Plant (STP), time-bound construction of STPs and decentralising STPs to meet the actual shortfall of treating about 400 MGD of sewage.
Earlier, an extensive project to rejuvenate Yamuna was taken up in mission mode in January 2023, under the National Green Tribunal (NGT) which mandated a high-level committee chaired by the LG committee. However, the committee stopped functioning after five meetings as the then-AAP government in Delhi approached the Supreme Court challenging its formation. However, the top court stayed the NGT order for the formation of the committee.
When the committee was in existence, the chemical oxygen demand (COD) and biological oxygen demand (BOD) started improving slightly on a month-on-month basis.
