Need to focus on interests of river cities by merging urban planning with river management: DG NMCG

New Delhi, Mr Rajiv Ranjan Mishra, Director General of National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), has said that there is an essential need to focus on the interests of river cities by merging urban planning with river management. National Faecal Sludge & Septage Management (NFSSM) Alliance brought together country’s leading policy makers and city leaders to deliberate on ”Opportunities for Co-Treatment of Septage at Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs)”, through a webinar. The discussions focused on recognizing the potential for cities and towns to convert existing underutilized sewage treatment plants (STPs) to co-treatment facilities to bring down the contamination of water bodies across the country. The Director General of National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), who was the keynote speaker at the webinar said, ”Fast but unorganized urbanization has put a load on natural resources. The system has not been able to give as much priority to wastewater management, or any other waste disposal, as compared to services such as provision of drinking water and other infrastructure needs.” Speaking about his experience in Kanpur while working for the Clean Ganga Mission, he highlighted the huge capacity utilization gap that was observed in the STPs, along with inadequate presence of a sewage network across the city. He further emphasized on the need for co-treatment especially in river cities in order to curb the dumping of septage into river bodies. ”There is an essential need to focus on the interests of river cities by merging urban planning with river management,” he said. Citing the example of Delhi, Ms Shailaja Chandra, Chairperson of the Monitoring Committee for Rejuvenation of River Yamuna spoke about her experience as the former Chief Secretary, Delhi, where over 7 million people in Delhi living in unauthorized colonies did not have access to a sewerage system. ”Ultimately all septage used to flow through the storm drains and into the Yamuna, polluting the river!” The magnitude of the problem was highlighted by Prof Srinivas Chary, Director, Centre for Energy, Environment, Urban Governance and Infrastructure Development, Administrative College of India (ASCI) who shared that 70 per cent of India’s Urban Households have onsite sanitation systems. The excreta from these systems is carried by unregulated private de-sludgers and often dumped without proper treatment into
water bodies. On the other hand, he highlighted that more than 1200 STPs in India are underutilized.
During the course of the webinar, the panelists led the discussion on how co-treatment involves treating septage from onsite sanitation systems like pit latrines and septic tanks, by introducing additional infrastructure at existing sewage treatment plants. The objective is to solve the dual issue of utilizing spare capacity of existing STPs and preventing indiscriminate dumping of sewage, especially for households in un-serviced areas.The panelists discussed the considerable preliminary research required before setting up a co-treatment facility, along with establishing the right SOPs to ensure sustainability in operations.