Union parliamentary affairs minister Kiren Rijiju on Friday responded to BJP MP Manoj Tiwari’s dip in the Yamuna River with a challenge, floating the idea of a “swimming competition” between them.
He claimed the stretch was cleaner during the AAP government, while citing Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) reports. “These BJP frauds know nothing about Delhi. He further invited Tiwari and Delhi water minister Parvesh Varma to drink the river’s water at Kalindi Kunj. Verma added that the upper stream of the Yamuna in Delhi – between Palla and Wazirabad – had been completely cleaned, and that cleaning was underway between Wazirabad and Kalindi Kunj.
Union home minister Amit Shah had, last week, launched a slew of Delhi Jal Board (DJB) projects worth ₹ 8,941.22 crore aimed at cleaning up the Yamuna. The Delhi government also recently organised a day-long cleanliness drive at 70 locations along the Yamuna’s ghats and floodplains. Cleaning and restoration efforts for the river have been underway since 1993, with the launch of the Yamuna Action Plan. Shah, following the launch of the clean-up projects, pledged that the BJP government would ensure that the river’s Delhi stretch is cleaned by 2029. Responding to the BJP MP’s remarks, AAP Delhi president Saurabh Bharadwaj said it was “well known that 26 km stretch of Yamuna river from Palla to Wazirabad has always been comparatively clean.
Bharadwaj said in a post on X, adding that the first nallah (drain) enters Yamuna at Wazirabad near Signature bridge. “That’s (the) 862 MGD (million gallons per day) drain which pollutes Yamuna first after 26 kms of its entry into Delhi,” the AAP leader added. This year too, they will run away,” Bharadwaj said in his post. Delhi water minister Verma had earlier said that the BJP had “never claimed that the Yamuna has been completely cleaned. “It will take around two-and-a-half to three years for the Yamuna to be completely clean,” news agency PTI cited Verma as saying. AAP leader Bharadwaj in his post also claimed that the Haryana government had been asked to release “extra fresh water into Yamuna from Hathnikund barrage” last year around Chhatth festival. “This extra water further dilutes the pollutant load and these jokers start their circus to fool the people of Delhi,” Bharadwaj said in the post.
“Last year also they ran away from the challenge. Tiwari had on Thursday posted a video of him taking a dip in the Yamuna River, seemingly to point to the river’s cleanliness, and had also invited Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Aam Aadmi Party national convenor Arvind Kejriwal to do the same.
