Centre notifies norms for uninterrupted flow of Ganga

Centre notifies norms for uninterrupted flow of Ganga

News:

1. The Centre has notified minimum environmental flow (e-flow) norms for river Ganga in order to restore and maintain a continuous flow to keep it clean through its natural ecological functions and processes.

Important Facts:

2. Background:

• The notification has been issued in the backdrop of ongoing ‘fast unto death’ by environmentalist and former IIT Kanpur faculty member GD Agarwal on issue of Ganga conservation.

3. About Environmental Flow (e-flow):

• Environmental flows refers to the acceptable flow regimes required to maintain a river in the desired environmental or predetermined state.
• E-flow is the quantity and timing of water that is essential for the river to perform its ecological functions and also important from the social and cultural standpoint.
• The e-flow of Ganga has been categorised for Upper Ganga River Basin for the stretch between Gaumukh, its origin to the confluence at Devprayag up to Haridwar.

4. Aim of the notification:

• To ensure that the river has the minimum required environmental flow of water even after the river flow gets diverted by projects and structures for purposes like irrigation, hydropower, domestic and industrial use.
• To comply with Centre’s Namami Gange river cleaning project, Aviral Dhara (uninterrupted flow) which is one of two important components, along with Nirmal Dhara (Unpolluted flow).
• During the dry season (November – March) 20% monthly average flow has to be maintained, 25% during the lean season (October-May) and 30% of the monthly flow of high season flow has to be maintained during the monsoon season.

5. E-flow norms of the notification:

• The minimum e-flow norms will apply to the upper Ganga River Basin starting from originating glaciers and through respective confluences of its head tributaries which meet at Devaprayag up to Haridwar and the main stem of the river Ganga up to Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh.
• Under the notification, the flow conditions in these river reaches will be monitored at hourly intervals from time to time.
• Any dam or structure meant for diversion of river flows for the purpose of irrigation, hydropower and domestic or industrial use will now have to maintain the minimum flow under the notification. There are 784 dams, 66 barrages, 92 weirs and 45 functional lift schemes located, at present, in the Ganga river basin.
• All existing projects, which currently do not meet the norms, will have to comply with it within three years.
• According to notification, the concerned project developers or authorities will have to install automatic data acquisition and data transmission facilities at appropriate locations at project sites within six months.
• Thus the project developers would be responsible for installation, calibration and maintenance of flow monitoring facility.
• The Central Water Commission (CWC) will be the designated authority and the custodian of the data. It will be responsible for supervision, monitoring, regulation of flows and submit a flow-cum-monitoring compliance report to National Mission for Clean Ganga each quarter.
• The CWC will also take emergent decisions about the water storage norms in case of any emergency.
• The mini and micro projects, which do not alter the flow characteristics of the river or stream significantly, are exempted from these environmental flow norms.
• Also the central government through National Mission for Clean Ganga may direct release of additional water in the river Ganga to meet special demand as and when required.

6. Criticism of e-flow norms:

• The government has not defined the methodology in estimating the e-flow in the river and the reference to the  minimum flow of the river is also very unclear.
• The other issue is on how the government is going to maintain the flow because supply has to be cut from somewhere to cater to dry areas and there are no clearly laid out plans for that.
• There is no credible monitoring mechanism in place and is not in line with an earlier report that asked for a broader assessment.”

7. Draft Ganga Act: The Centre had formed a committee in 2016 under the chairmanship of Justice (retired) Giridhar Malviya to frame a draft for the Ganga Act, in a bid to provide stricter action against polluting the river.

• The draft Act addresses critical issues pertaining to Ganga on its cleanliness (Nirmalta) and uninterrupted environmental flow (Aviralta) and provides corresponding provisions thereof.
• The draft says the existing environmental laws are not adequate to restore and protect the 2,500-km-long river.
• The draft act has listed out a list of offences marked as cognisable. These include construction activities causing obstruction in the river, withdrawal of groundwater for industrial or commercial consumption from the land fronting the river and its tributaries; commercial fishing or aquaculture in the river and its tributaries; discharging untreated or treated sewage into the river.
• It has also suggested that the Armed Ganga Protection Corps (GPC) personnel will have power to arrest those who pollute the river covering offences like obstructing the flow of the river, commercial fishing to construction of illegal structures in active flood plains along with  imprisonment of 2-5 years.
• The Ganga Protection Corps personnel will be provided by the Ministry of Home Affairs and will be deployed by the National Ganga Rejuvenation Authority.