‘CREATED A CHIMERA OF FREE WATER’: DELHI L-G PENS OPEN LETTER TO KEJRIWAL OVER WATER WOES
Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena on Tuesday wrote an open letter to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal over the water problems being faced in the national capital, which according to him have ‘exacerbated over the last decade’.
Kejriwal is presently placed under judicial custody in Tihar Jail following arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the Delhi liquor policy case.
The Lieutenant Governor strongly criticised the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government and highlighted its inaction and inefficiency over the past decade in addressing water scarcity issues.
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The L-G hit out at Delhi’s water resources minister Atishi, accusing her of using the killing of a woman in East Delhi’s Shahdara, for ‘narrow and partisan political goals.’ In his open letter, the L-G said, “Having underlined the inadequate supply of water as the cause behind the incident, Atishi has ironically indicted her own government of more than 09 years. Her note indeed is a prima facie admission of guilt, inaction and inefficiency over the past almost 10 years.”
The lieutenant governor slammed Atishi for attacking the chief secretary, Delhi Jal Board (DJB) chief executive officer, officers of finance and urban development department.
“It has almost now become habitual on part of your ministers to blame officers for their own failures, be it in the field of health, hospitals, sanitation, education or water supply,” the L-G wrote.
“I wish she had demonstrated maturity and restraint, which is expected of a person occupying high office,” he added.
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The Delhi L-G cited the economic survey tabled by Atishi, which stated that over the last 10 years, the water treatment capacity grew marginally from 906 MGD to 946 MGD, barely a 4.4 percent increase.
“During the same period, the population of the city has grown significantly by 15 percent. The overall shortfall in water supply amounts to about 290 MGD. Of the total water being supplied, 120 MGD comes from groundwater extraction, which is also a gross exaggeration,” he added.
“I am sure that you are aware that of the sixteen Ranney wells, five are non-functional. Similarly, a large number of tubewells are also dysfunctional,” the L-G added.
Saxena, who is often at odds with the AAP government, took a dig at the Chief Minister’s promise to “transform Delhi into Singapore”. “It would be educative to know that in Singapore “unaccounted for water” is just five per cent, compared to Delhi’s 58 per cent. Even other Indian cities fare much better than Delhi – Chennai (35 per cent), Mumbai (27 per cent), Pune (35 per cent).”
Unaccounted for water is a sum of water leakages by way of transmission and distribution losses, water theft and non-payment of dues.
The L-G also pointed out that more than two crore out of 2.5 crore people in the city are “deprived of drinking water supply in varying degrees, especially in unauthorised colonies, slum clusters and to a lesser extent, even in organized developed colonies”.
“Instead of fixing the iniquitous water supply, you and your ministers created a chimera of free water. Deception of people has been mastered into an art form by you and your ministers,” L-G Saxena wrote.
Atishi hit back at Saxena over the open letter, holding him responsible for the stoppage of Delhi Jal Board (DJB) works. The minister said the L-G’s letter “may be intended for optics” but it cannot be denied that the water crisis has been artificially created. She cited instructions issued and claimed things could not taken off due to “a conspiracy that stopped the release of funds to the Delhi Jal Board”.
The Delhi water minister had a few days ago written to the L-G, asking him to suspend the CEO of Delhi Jal Board (DJB) after a woman was killed following a quarrel with her neighbour over fetching water from a common tap in the Farsh Bazar area of northeast Delhi.
In the note, Atishi urged Saxena to “institute an independent inquiry into the acts of omission and commission of the chief secretary, as well as officers of the finance department, urban development department and DJB”.
Days after the communication, Saxena penned a strongly worded open letter to Kejriwal, currently lodged in Tihar jail after his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate in a money laundering case linked to the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy scam case.
(With inputs from PTI)
2024-04-17T04:58:15Z dg43tfdfdgfd