Nearly 1/4th of MCD drains in Delhi are yet to be desilted: Report

Indian Express

8 hours ago

The Southwest monsoon has reached the Capital, and 77.5% of drains have been desilted across the city, as per the Municipal Corporation of Delhi's status report. A total of 2,29,018 metric tonnes of silt has been removed from the drains that come under the civic body's jurisdiction in 12 zones till June 23, the report underlined.
The report was issued by the civic body after questions were raised on monsoon preparedness at the first meeting of the Standing Committee on June 27.
At 59%, Karol Bagh was at the bottom of the list of 12 zones achieving the total desilting target. In some areas, such as Central Zone and Keshav Puram, the total silt removed exceeded the estimated tonnes of silt.
Desilting is an ongoing process, said officials — it started on January 1 and is being carried out in a phased manner. The target is set for the entire year, as per the report. The civic body said a Rs 36 crore budget has been allocated for 2025-2026 for drain cleaning.
The report has been segregated into two parts: drains with a depth or width of less than 4 feet, and more than 4 feet. As per an overview of the data, the civic body has desilted small drains in large numbers, but deeper and larger drains remain to be cleared.
While Najafgarh, the longest running drain in Delhi, achieved 110% of the desilting target, only 67% of the drains of height or width of 4 feet and above have been desilted in the area.
For North Shahdara Zone, the MCD cleared 100 of % silt from small drains (less than 4-ft deep), but only 60% of the targeted silt had been removed from bigger drains.
Likewise, for the South Zone, only 63% of silt from the 45 km stretch of deeper drains has been removed before the monsoon.
For the West Zone, while 86% of the small drains are cleared, only 67% of the targeted silt from deeper drains has been cleared, as per the report.
Six super sucker machines, 10 jetting machines, 32 suction–cum-jetting machines, and 25 skid-steer loaders are being used in the process. The report mentions that the removed silt will be disposed of at the sanitary landfill (SLF) sites in Ghazipur, Bhalswa, and Okhla.