New Delhi, Dec 5 (UNI) Union Minister for Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday said the government has freed Kanpur from the ill effects of Sisamau drain, which was infamous for the pollution it was causing to River Ganga after 128 years.
Th Minister said that 140 MLD of waste water has been stopped from flowing into River Ganga.
Speaking after inaugurating the 'India Water Impact Summit 2018' (December 5-7) being organised here, Mr Gadkari expressed his satisfaction over the positive feedback being received for Clean Ganga Mission and assured the people of the country that their dream of rejuvenated Ganga will soon be fulfilled.
He said with the support of all stakeholders, the work on Clean Ganga Mission is going on war footing and the hard work of all stakeholders has started to show visible results on ground.
Six reports prepared by cGanga were released on the occasion regarding flow regimes and Ganga River Basin Management Plan of five main stem Ganga basin states.
Green Ganga App, developed by Remote Sensing Centre of ISRO was also launched during the occasion.
Green Ganga App is used for geo-tagging of saplings and delineation of plantation boundaries under ongoing afforestation activities of Namami Gange programme. The touch-enabled information kiosk about Namami Gange programme, developed jointly by NMCG and ISRO, was also launched.
Mr Gadkari said since inception of Ganga cleaning programme (1985) till 2014, central government had spent less than Rs 4000 crore. With the launch of Namami Gange programme, provision of Rs 20,000 crore have been made for 5 years. So far, National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) has sanctioned 254 projects for more than Rs 24,000 crore and has spent about Rs 5,000 crore in the last 4 years.
He said not only has the pace of expenditure increased manifold, results are visible on the ground as well. 'Out of these 254 projects, 133 are for sewerage management, 11 bioremediation, one modular STP, 1 rural sanitation, 64 ghat and crematoria, 6 bio-diversity and 16 afforestation projects,' Mr Gadkari informed the gathering.
He added that 133 sewerage infrastructure projects costing Rs 19,789 crore will create 3969 MLD of sewage treatment capacity and lay down 4871 kilometer of sewerage network.
Reiterating the focus on tributaries of Ganga, Mr Gadkari said that 26 projects are being taken up on tributaries like Yamuna, Saryu, Ram Ganga, Gomti, Kali, Kosi, Gandak, Damodar, Rispana-Bindal etc.
Mr Gadkari also mentioned that the Aviralta of River Ganga has also been given importance and to ensure that required level of ecological flow is always maintained, a notification has already been published in October.
Following this a meeting has been held with all state Chief Secretaries asking them to implement the e flow notification.
Mr Gadkari also talked about the success story of Hybrid Annuity mode (HAM) in sewage water sector and One-City-One-Operator for integrating the development of new STPs with the existing treatment infrastructure under HAM.
Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri complimented the Namami Gange programme for making Clean Ganga Mission a mass movement and said that all possible efforts required from his ministry is being provided in the form of three main works that include making villages Open Defecation Free, implementing Liquid Waste Treatment and Solid Waste Management.
He said under Namami Gange programme, 97 towns within 5 kilometers of River Ganga have been identified where interventions are being made. He further said that Swachh Bharat Mission is helping villages along Ganga to become ODF.
Minister of State for Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation Satya Pal Singh hoped that the Clean Ganga Mission will be immensely benefitted from the ideas which come during the three-day long summit and said that foreign collaboration is very important for the task of Ganga Rejuvenation.
UNI NY AR 2017