The report (Review of Upper Yamuna River Cleaning Project Up to Delhi and River Bed Management) confirms what is known, that the Yamuna is mostly a dead river in its Delhi stretch. Very little aquatic life survives in its waters. The Delhi Pollution Control Committee report for February shows that the faecal coliform level at the exit point of the river in Delhi is the highest since December 2020. This is not surprising since the raw sewage the river receives is more than the city’s total sewage treatment capacity. An equally important fact is that “there is almost NIL environment flow downstream of Wazirabad barrage” in nine out of 12 months in a year. In short, there is fresh water in the Yamuna only during the monsoon months, i.e. July, August and September. So, just as the government augments the sewage treatment infrastructure, dredges the river of accumulated waste and silt, and removes encroachments on its floodplains, it must also ensure environmental flow (e-flow) in the river. The e-flow in Yamuna presently is merely 0.86 million cubic metre (mcm)/day as against a minimum requirement of 6.6 mcm/day. In 1999, the Supreme Court directed that a minimum e-flow of 10 mcm of water be maintained throughout the year. This is near impossible since most of the river water is diverted into canals upstream at Hathni Kund Barrage in Haryana, which feeds farms in Haryana and Uttar Pradesh (UP).

This is why a collaborative effort involving Delhi, Haryana and UP becomes central to any Yamuna revival plan. Two of the major tributaries that join the Yamuna in Delhi, the Hindon on the eastern bank and the Sahibi (often referred to as the Najafgarh drain) on the west, originate in Haryana and UP respectively. These rivers are hugely polluted at their point of merger with the Yamuna. “Double-engine governments” in all three states and the Centre must work together to rejuvenate the Yamuna basin and ensure at least minimum e-flow in the river. Together with other conservation efforts, the Yamuna can surely be restored to the state of a living river.