By Sidharth Mishra

In these very columns a very days back we had mentioned that how Delhi was already flooded in several areas even before the water from Hathni Kund Barrage arrived in the national Capital. These were the areas which were much away from the river and they stood water logged largely because of the unclean and clogged drainage system.

This happened due to the failure of the Delhi Jal Board and the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), to clean the drains on time, as practise in the past, before the arrival of the Monsoon in the city. Both these autonomous bodies are firmly under the political control of Aam Aadmi Party, with its MLA Somanth Bharti heading the Jal Board and its leader Shelly Oberoi as Mayor heading the MCD.

Now let’s come to the floods in the Yamuna, whose waters have entered the areas between the Red Fort and the river and further down the river near the ITO crossing. The flood waters entered the seat of Delhi Government, the Players’ Building on the Yamuna bank and the adjoining Indira Gandhi Stadium complex.

It also entered areas north of Red Fort in the Civil Lines specially the Inter State Bus Terminus (ISBT) at Kashmere Gate and the Majnoo Ka Tila area on the Outer Ring Road. In their defence, Arvind Kejriwal government has said that the flood waters entered because the Yamuna breached the 1978 mark.

The old-timers would recall that doing the 1978 floods, the effect was so widespread that in Model Town the water level was till the first floor. There was this famous instance of Indira Gandhi, then in Opposition, arriving in Model Town in a boat and meeting up with Congress leader HKL Bhagat, who was stuck on the first floor of the house.

This time despite breaching the 1978 mark, the water levels did not even enter Model Town, forget about rising levels. This has happened because in the past 45 years increasing ‘channelization’ of Yamuna has taken place and spread of water being controlled. Therefore, the level of spread despite breaching the 1978 mark is not as wide as it was then.

Yamuna has been crossing the danger mark regularly since 1992 that the writer has followed the city as journalist but the city has never been flooded. In fact in 2010, there was torrential rains not only in the Himachal hills and in the city just ahead of the Commonwealth Games. But city managed to avert floods and got the premises including the Games Villages on the Yamuna bed ready in time for the mega event.

Between 1978 and now, several measures have been taken regarding the flow of Yamuna through the city including the building of the three barrages at Wazirabad, ITO and Okhla. These barrages are managed by the Irrigation department of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh governments, solely for the reason that they have much bigger workforce and they have to handle much longer portion of the course (1376 kilometres) of the river than in Delhi, which is just for 48 kilometres.

Of the total stretch of Yamuna, which starts in Uttarkhand largely flows through Haryana before entering Delhi at Palla village and exiting at Okhla into UP. Between Palla and Wazirabad barrage there is a distance of 22 kilometres before the regulation of the river starts for the next 26 kilometres. It’s in this stretch that several trunk drains of the city fall into the Yamuna as also Sahibi River which is better known as the Najafgarh drain.

It’s not that the Delhi government doesn’t have a role in the regulation of the barrages in the city. They work under the superintendence of the Irrigation and Flood Control Departments of Delhi Government. Presently these departments are under the charge of Saurabh Bhardwaj, who had been ferreting the conspiracy theories for the flood water entering the national Capital.

In fact there was no understanding within the Delhi government as to who was responsible for handling floods. Initially it were PWD Minister Atishi who went for photo ops travelling in a boat in a dry river. However as soon the river got flooded she disappeared realsing it were to be handled by another colleague.

While the Irrigation departments of the Haryana and UP governments manage the barrage gates, the bunds (embankments) are responsibility of the Delhi government. Water entered Delhi Secretariat because the bund was breached near ITO. The situation was salvaged by the engineers from the Army who repaired the breach.

Those who travel on the Outer Ring Road beyond where the Red Fort walls end, this writer regularly does, would recall that every year temporary bunds are built putting sand bags. There are done in advance so that the embankments are firmed up much before the levels in the Yamuna rises.

The water levels in the Yamuna has started to rise from last Monday whereas it breached the bund at ITO only on Friday and entered city near ITO on the intervening night of Wednesday-Thursday. On Wednesday last this writer was witness to the hurried deployment of sand bags near Monastery and ISBT when the water had already started to enter the low lying areas. The question is who should be blamed for this delayed reinforcement?

Certainly the blame lies with the Irrigation and Flood Control department of Delhi government. The minister in charge Saurabh Bhardwaj should be taken to task for not discharging his duties, even in ignorance. Delhi has suffered and it has suffered because of the government which failed to act timely.   

(First Published in The First Post)