PWD completes 82% drain desilting as monsoon sets in

new delhi: As the monsoon arrives in the national capital, civic agencies race towards completing the desilting work with PWD and have completed 82 per cent of the work, according to a statement issued on Monday.

Irrigation and Flood Control Department has completed 100 per cent desilting of large drains, officials said on Monday.

Waterlogging is a serious problem that the city faces, disrupting traffic movement every year during monsoon season. The Public Works Department (PWD, which manages 2,148 kilometres of drain network across the city roads, carried out the work in 35 packages this year.

As part of comprehensive desilting work, the government this year has gone for two-year contracts so that work is executed efficiently, officials added. The department has, to date, removed around 44,335 metric tons of silt from drains across the city.

Before the monsoon, Chief Minister Rekha Gupta had held several meetings with all the concerned departments regarding preparedness and gave clear instructions to make Delhi “waterlogging free”, stating that one of the major factors for flooding is choked drains.

The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has cleared over 1.93 lakh metric tons of silt from drains across the national capital.

The New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC), which manages the New Delhi area, has completed the desilting of its drains in the first phase, approximately 335 km of drain length is under NDMC, officials said. The irrigation and flood control department, which maintains all the big drains in the city, has also completed 100 per cent of the desilting work till Sunday night in 76 drains, excluding the Najafgarh drain. According to officials, around 11,51,447 metric tonnes of silt was removed from the drains and 83 per cent of it was disposed of at designated locations.

This year the PWD has also decided to carry out a third-party audit of the desilting work done, and officials stated that one of the three—IIT Delhi, Delhi Technical University (DTU), and Netaji Subhas University of Technology—will carry out the work.

“We have written to these institutions to carry out the audit, a response is awaited yet. One of the maintenance zones will be made in charge of the entire process,” officials said.

Meanwhile, the PWD has decided that no transfer orders of any official will be in effect in light of the upcoming monsoon season.

This year the PWD has put 194 locations on its watchlist, of these, 126 belong to PWD and 61 belong either to the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), Delhi Metro, Delhi Development Authority (DDA), MCD or NDMC.