Not appropriate to say none of the Ganga projects have made any headway: Satyapal Singh

It is not appropriate to say that none of the Ganga projects have seen any progress in the past several decades, Union minister Satyapal Singh told the Lok Sabha today, stating that a network of 2,050 km sewer lines under the Namami Gange project has been set up, besides installing sewage treatment plants.

"It is not a fact that none of the clean Ganga projects have been able to get any headway in the past several decades. In fact, sewage treatment capacity of approximately 1,684 million litres per day (MLD) has been created through interception and diversion (I&D) and Sewage Treatment Plant (STP) projects since 1985 in Ganga Action Plan (GAP-I), GAP-II, National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA), Namami Ganga and other schemes in the towns along Ganga," the minister of state for Ganga Rejuvenation said in a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha.

In case of sewer network, "out of 4,812 km of sanctioned sewer network, approximately 2,050 km sewer lines have been laid till now under the Namami Gange Programme, including the National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA)," he added.

In response to a separate question, Singh said under the Namami Gange project, work on 34 ghats and nine crematoriums has been completed.

The expenditure incurred on construction of ghats and crematoriums till March 2018 was Rs 159.22 crore, he said.

"Under the Namami Gange programme, 37 projects have been sanctioned for construction of 151 ghats and 54 crematoria in five basin states. Of these 34 ghats and nine crematoria have been completed till date," Singh said.

Of the 34 completed ghats, 10 are in Uttarakhand, 23 in Uttar Pradesh and one in Jharkhand. All the nine crematoriums are in Uttarakhand.