Over 35,000 volunteers participated in the one-day Yamuna floodplain cleanliness campaign on October 18, which saw the removal of 86,600 kg of waste from 70 riverfront ghats across the city, Delhi water minister Parvesh Verma said on Monday
“We will create specialised huts where such events can take place. People can come and celebrate their birthday while spending some time with family volunteering for clean-up of the Yamuna ghats,” he added. Addressing a Press conference a day after the mega drive, Verma said the volunteers included 20,000 workers from various NGOs, 10,500 Bharatiya Janata Party members, and students from 27 Delhi University colleges. During the drive, 76,755 kg of dry waste, plastic bags, and religious offerings, along with 9,850 kg of green waste and water hyacinth, were cleared from the banks, he said. The minister said equipment deployed along the banks included more than 250 Public Works Department (PWD) maintenance vans, hundreds of Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) vehicles, and specialised weed harvesters. Verma said Union home minister Amit Shah will lay foundation stones and launch key river-cleaning projects worth ₹ 8,941 crore near the Urban Extension Road-2 (UER-2) in west Delhi on October 22. Verma said he will lead by example and celebrate his birthday on Yamuna ghats on November 7.
These include new sewage treatment plants (STPs) by the Delhi Jal Board, household sewer connections for lakhs of homes in Delhi, and the expansion of the sewer-line network, he said. The minister said cleanup drives aim to build a bond between the river and its people, and urged people to celebrate their birthdays on the riverbanks.
