Brackish canal water flowing through Punjab, Rajasthan a cause of concern for residents

Rajat Swami, spokesperson of Bhartiya Janta Yuva Morcha – Ganganagar district, said, “Although this is not a new thing for us, we are really upset over getting this black-coloured water from Punjab. The Rajasthan government has been highlighting this issue for years now. Polluted water from Ludhiana gets added in Sutlej River which comes towards Harike headworks in Ferozepur from where our Gang Canal originates. This canal thus takes water from Harike headworks and crossing Ferozepur, Fazilka, it enters Sri Ganganagar and further goes to Bikaner. We use this water for drinking and irrigation, but how can we use such polluted water for these purposes?”

Information revealed that around 2000 cusecs of water is flowing through Gang Canal, while Sirhind feeder canal is another canal that originates from Harike headworks which has various distributaries that pass through Bathinda, Muktsar, Faridkot, Fazilka areas but culminate in Punjab only. They don’t go further ahead towards Rajasthan.

“Canal water was stopped in Sirhind feeder after a breach had occurred on March 27 near Faridkot, but on April 7 or 8 water was again released into this canal. Abohar branch is the distributary of this canal which reaches Abohar and Balluana area of Fazilka. Black water kept on coming for 4-5 days after that it got diluted as water flow in canal had increased,” says Raju Sekhon, a Balluana-based farmer. When the water flow increases, the polluted water gets diluted and the water appears a little muddy.

Rajasthan canal is the third canal which originates from Harike headworks which has a capacity of carrying 18000 cusecs of water but it normally carries only 12000 cusecs of water. However, these days it has been closed for repair works and so, Sirhind feeder and Gang Canal are the only water-supplying canals to Malwa districts and Rajasthan, respectively .

Rajat Swami added, “The Punjab CM must look into this perennial problem (of pollution) as he himself advocates that canal water should be used for drinking and irrigation in order to save groundwater. But today even canal water is becoming unfit for drinking.”

Jaskirat Singh of NGOs – Naroa Punjab Manch and Public Action Committee (PAC ) – said, “It’s high time that all sewage treatment plants (STPs), common effluent treatment plants (CETPs), and effluent treatment plants (ETPs) are audited by a high-powered committee of independent experts without involvement of Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB). We have seen in Zira how involvement of PPCB in any testing process gave skewed results. A team of experts and scientists from universities should do the audit and its recommendations should be strictly followed by the government.”

He added, “Sutlej river is fairly clean till it reaches village Kasabad in Ludhiana. The first big sewer that falls into Sutlej on entering Ludhiana is in village Bhattian which is next to Kasabad. This drain is the outlet for Bhattian STP which carries treated sewage and textile industry effluents from Bahadurke area.” Sources said that although this water is treated, many a time it is black in colour.”

Jaskirat Singh said, “The biggest source of Sutlej pollution is in village Walipur near Humbran in Ludhiana. The 700 million litres per day (MLD ) heady mix of dyeing effluents, untreated dairy waste and partially treated sewage of entire Ludhiana city falls into the Sutlej here. The dissolved oxygen (DO) level of the river drops to below 3 mg/L at this point. For fish or any aquatic organism to survive it needs at least 4 mg/L of DO. So essentially the Sutlej carries a big baggage of polluted water after crossing Ludhiana and merging with Buddha Dariya.”

He added, “Our NGOs have held several meetings with the local bodies department, pollution control board department over this issue and we keep doing our bit to raise awareness. Saving water and cleaning polluted water both are equally important.”

Skin disorders, kidney and liver problems, cancer, hepatitis C are the common health issues caused due to consuming water which is not properly treated.

When The Indian Express contacted Hardeep Singh Mehandiratta, superintendent engineer (SE) canals at Harike headworks, he said, “Water was brackish in Sirhind feeder canal and Gang Canal a few days ago. But now it is okay, according to my knowledge. I need to check if polluted water is still flowing in Gang Canal. Checking of pollution levels in the river and canal water is the domain of PPCB. Sutlej water comes to Harike headworks after crossing several cities, so many factors are responsible for the water pollution. Whenever canal water supply is discontinued for a few days/weeks and afterwards when it is released again, the stored water at headworks is discoloured but not always.”

Sandeep Bahl, chief engineer PPCB Ludhiana, while talking to The Indian Express, however, gave a clean chit to the industries. He said, “By and large, water in Sutlej River doesn’t carry industrial effluents. A few black sheep may be there who dump such effluents, but we always keep a check. In Punjab there is 2211 MLD sewage discharge by 163 urban local bodies (ULBs) and 137 STPs have been installed by these ULBs which treat 2058 MLD of sewage waste. The gap of untreated waste is still there, but we take up this matter with ULBs on a regular basis. Setting up 64 more STPs are under planning stage. Ludhiana has three CETPs for treating industrial effluents and one in Jalandhar for treating effluents of canneries. The main issue is that ULBs are throwing the treated sewage discharge into the Sutlej which we tell them to use for irrigation purposes instead of dumping it in the river. Our efforts to make rivers clean are continuously going on.”