Delhi Jal Board approves rejuvenation of 159 water bodies

The water bodies will also have landscaping and horticulture work done around them for public attraction.
Yamuna River (File photo | PTI)
Yamuna River (File photo | PTI)

NEW DELHI: Getting closer to the vision of making Delhi a ‘City of Lakes’ like Udaipur in Rajasthan, the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) in its meeting on Monday approved natural water rejuvenation work at 159 water bodies and to create two new lakes in the city. With an approved budget of Rs 453 crore, the DJB will break the ground in the next two months for developing groundwater recharging facilities and create an additional reserves of water. In addition, three other big lakes would be developed in the next one and a half years by the DJB.

The water bodies will also have landscaping and horticulture work done around them for public attraction.

However, there is much more to be done. “Although this is a welcome development but more importantly, the DJB needs to regulate unauthorised borewells that have come up in huge numbers. The problem is these borewells have become commercial. In water bodies, 50 per cent of the water evaporates so protecting the underground water is very important,” said Manoj Mishra, water activist.   

“There are approximately 600 water bodies found by the authorities and are in revivable state. Now in the first phase, 159 of the 600 are taken by the DJB and 29 lakes which are not in good shape are being revived by the Irrigation and Flood Control Department. Different methods would be put to use for reviving such as rainwater harvesting and sewage treatment, depending on the condition of each area,” said a DJB official. 

The rejuvenation process would be based on model water body in Rajokari where a pond in terrible shape was transformed into a water treatment garden. In the first phase, the Delhi government is in consultation with NEERI, IIT Delhi and WAPCOS, which is a PSU under the Union Ministry of Water Resources. 

The DJB official also informed that many of the 600 water bodies are not under the jurisdiction of the Delhi government as the land-owning agency DDA has quite a few under their jurisdiction. “We will get a detailed project report for them also but the cost of reviving the bodies will be their responsibility,” said the official.

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