Day after SC notice, state scrambles to prepare response

KARNAL: A day after the Supreme Court took suo motu cognisance of the significantly high levels of ammonia in the water discharged from Haryana into the Capital and issued a notice to the state government, a meeting was held on Thursday under the chief secretary to prepare a response regarding the steps being taken to rectify the issue.

Haryana State Pollution Control Board (HSPCB) member secretary S Naryanan said, “The state government has prepared a detailed action plan to treat effluents in sewage treatment plants (STPs) and regular inspections are being made to check unauthorised units from discharging untreated effluents.”

Notably, the HSPCB, in a report submitted to the National Green Tribunal, had said untreated effluents from 11 drains flowing through Yamunanagar, Panipat, Sonepat, Gurgaon and Faridabad were the root cause behind pollution in the Yamuna.

The monthly review meeting of the Yamuna Monitoring Committee held under the chairpersonship of chief secretary Vijai Vardhan on December 12, 2020 had found that around 66 MLD (million liters per day) of untreated effluents from the industrial cities of Yamunanagar and Jagadhri was being discharged into Yamuna.

This waste includes 52 MLD of domestic discharge and 19.7 MLD as industrial discharge.

It was observed that three STPs and four common effluent treatment plants (CETPs) in Sonepat were non-complying, effluents of three STPs were being bypassed, and three STPs did not have a flow meter in their outlets. Moreover, no STP is functional in Faridabad and a 45 MLD STP, which is under repair, will only become functional in July.

The committee said 12 of 16 STPs were found to be non-complying and Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation (HSIIDC).