Delhi Govt offers plan for revival of Yamuna (Asian Age 15 March 2010)

In a fresh bid to revive the dying Yamuna, the Delhi government has come up with a novel proposal. It wants the upper riparian states -Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh -to ensure that the 22-km-long stretch of the river flowing through Delhi remains pollution-free. It has come up with a draft bill, which it would like Parliament to pass, to ensure this.
The Yamuna River Development Authority, constituted by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and headed by Delhi lieutenant-governor Tejendra Khanna, formulated the draft bill to regulate the release of water into the Yamuna to make it a "running" river instead of a "standing" one as it has been reduced to now.
In a fresh bid to revive the dying river Yamuna in the capital, Delhi government has now come up with a somewhat unprecedented proposal. It wants the upper riparian states too to take responsibility for ensuring that the 22-km long stretch of the river flowing through the capital remains pollutionfree. So, it has come up with a draft bill, which it would like Parliament to pass, so that the upper riparian states share the task of keeping the Yamuna clean.
The Yamuna River Development Authority (YRDA) constituted by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and headed by Delhi lieutenant governor Tejendra Khanna has come up with the draft bill which states that the upper riparian states of Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh too be made accountable in ensuring that there is a prescribed release of water into the Yamuna in order to make it a "running" river instead of the "standing" one that it has been reduced to at present.
While the states, which the proposed legislation wants to make responsible, may resist the move, it appears necessary given that the once magnificent river has been reduced to a dirty stream as it winds its way through the country's capital. The YRDA will be shortly submitting its report to the PM along with a copy of the draft bill, which has been prepared by the law and justice department of the Delhi government, hoping that one day it will get Parliament's nod.
"The draft Bill envisages a two-pronged strategy to revive the 22-km long Yamuna as it passes through Delhi. First, to build reservoirs in the upper riparian states to store rain water which can be released whenever required to ensure a regular flow throughout the year," said sources.
"The second is to physically clean the river in Delhi. A central authority will have to be set up to oversee the construction and functioning of reservoirs in the upper riparian states. A state-level authority will oversee the work of physical cleaning of the river in Delhi," they added. The sources said that once the draft bill takes the form of an Act and steps are taken to implement the law, there would be tangible results by 2013 or 2014, implying that the river's condition would improve dramatically in a span of four years.
The report and the draft bill have been prepared after the technical advisory group of the YRDA and various stakeholders, including numerous NGOs and experts, held several rounds of meetings.
The idea for the legislation to clean the Yamuna has come in the backdrop of the failure of the Yamuna Action Plan I. The government has till now spent over Rs 1,800 crores to clean the river but it failed to yield any tangible results.
However, to initiate the physical cleaning of the river, the Delhi Jal Board plans to set up interceptors for sewers along major drains to reduce the huge flow of domestic waste and industrial effluents into the Yamuna which significantly contribute to its pollution.