With the civic agencies facing the heat from the National Green Tribunal for sitting on the Yamuna revitalisation project, the Delhi Development Authority has invited expression of interest from NGOs and other agencies for treating religious waste generally disposed of in the river.
The DDA had on March 28 invited expression of interest from “NGOs/ reputed agencies who have expertise in treating and processing puja samagri / religious materials [through some processing unit] to keep the Yamuna clean and pollution-free”.
The NGOs will be required to collect, manage and process religious materials from identified sites along the stretch of the Yamuna in Delhi.
Interested parties have been asked to write in by April 17. The advertisement was issued after the NGT pulled up civic agencies for not acting on the its orders on cleaning up the Yamuna by 2017.
On Friday, the Tribunal had warned of its powers to attach property and direct civil imprisonment of officials concerned for not implementing its orders.
The NGT had announced a fine of Rs.5,000 for dumping waste in the Yamuna and Rs.50,000 for dumping debris in the river.
The DDA has also been directed by the Tribunal to ensure physical demarcation of the floodplains.
The Tribunal had directed the Department of Irrigation of the Delhi to provide a detailed floodplain map of the city to the DDA and the Uttar Pradesh government in three days. Following this, Uttar Pradesh will have to provide requisite data on the area of the Yamuna floodplain within its territorial limits from Palla to Wazirabad and downstream from Okhla.
The DDA will then ensure physical demarcation of the floodplain area within one week thereafter.
