Meeting with Chief Secy, MCD in 10 days to resolve issue of desilting drains, Irrigation dept tells NGT

In an affidavit filed on February 25, Choudhary had said that the drains are covered in many areas for “utilisation of various purposes like parking, parks… by various agencies”.

He had added that the desilting of the covered portions has to be carried out by the “drain covering agencies” before they are handed over to the I&FC department.

The NGT bench headed by Chairperson Justice Prakash Shrivastava on Thursday observed that adequate time has passed and if desilting is not completed within the stipulated time, it would pose a threat due to flooding concerns.

“… an inter-departmental dispute is going on, which renders ineffective the Delhi High Court’s directions last year to hand over the entire responsibility of drains to a single agency… Unless the cleaning of the covered portion of the drains is done, the problem of overflowing of drains will not be remediated,” Justice Shrivastava said.

The NGT directed Choudhary to file a fresh affidavit on the steps to be taken to desilt the two key drains and also ensure that work for the rest gets completed within the deadline.

Choudhary informed the tribunal that a meeting with the Chief Secretary, GNCTD (Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi), and the MCD Commissioner will be held in 10 days to resolve the matter.

On April 8, 2024, the Delhi High Court had directed the Delhi government to ensure that desilting of the drains is completed by December that year, with the desilting of the Najafgarh drain to be completed by June 30, 2025. Following this, during the 17th meeting of the Integrated Drain Management Cell in April, it was decided that the responsibility for all the open drains, which open into Yamuna, be handed over to the I&FC Department.

However, work was formally handed over to the I&FC Department by agencies such as the MCD only in December 2024.

With a target to remove over 12.7 crore metric tonnes of silt from the drains, the I&FC gave a new deadline to the NGT on February 21. Except for the Najafgarh drain, whose desilting is expected to be completed in three years, all the other drains, including key ones like those in Barapullah, Shahdara and Kushak, work is to be completed by May end, ahead of the monsoon season.

The NGT had said in its February 21 order that if the desilting work is not completed within the deadline, monsoon will arrive and residents of areas where these drains are located may again face waterlogging and flooding. It had then asked the Additional Chief Secretary (I&FC) to submit an undertaking by February 25, stating that work will be completed within the stipulated deadline.

On February 25, in an undertaking, the department had said that while the Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board has completed its survey on the Barapullah drain, the Revenue Department has surveyed the Sen Nursing Home drain. The rest of the drains had been handed over to it for maintenance purposes, it had added.

It had further said that the construction of boundary walls around the drains would be taken up based on the availability of funds and land for the same.