Rising river water level leaves large areas vulnerable in Delhi

Parts of Mayur Vihar, Laxmi Nagar, Sarai Kale Khan, Badarpur, Jamia Nagar, Shaheen Bagh may get flooded if Yamuna river continues to rise

Parts of Mayur Vihar, Laxmi Nagar, Sarai Kale Khan, Badarpur, Jamia Nagar, Shaheen Bagh may get flooded if the water in Yamuna continues to rise at the current levels, the Delhi government has warned.

People waiting for help at the Yamuna Sabzi Mandi wade through floodwaters near Mayur Vihar on Wednesday. (Raj K Raj/HT Photo)

Read here: From Wazirabad to Vikas Marg — Ring Road: Delhi’s key roads affected as Yamuna swells

The river, which inundated many low lying areas located close to its banks, was flowing at its all time highest level of 208.08 metresat 11pm on Wednesday. According to official data, the river level rose 1.85metres in the 48 hours till 8pm. The Central Water Commission (CWC) said the water level may reach 208 metres by 5am on Thursday, but the level was breached seven hours earlier.

Large swathes of residential areas and infrastructure in the Capital are located either on the floodplain or very close to it leaving them vulnerable if the river breaches its flood levels. According to a report by the Yamuna Monitoring Committee of the National Green Tribunal (NGT), over 900 hectares of the Yamuna floodplains have been encroached upon in Delhi.

In 1978, when the city recorded its worst flood, the Yamuna was flowing at 207.4 metres, and submerged several colonies including Model Town, Mukherjee Nagar and Nirankari Colony in north Delhi and Maharani Bagh, Okhla, and New Friends Colony in south Delhi. The Wazirabad bridge was also shut for traffic

Bhim Singh Rawat, a Yamuna activist and member of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People (SANDRP), said in 1978, there were fewer embankments and they were not as high as they are today. “In 1978, the flood water reached as far as GT Karnal Road, about 10 kms west of the Yamuna bank. However, if a breach takes place, then we may see a similar scenario. Even without a breach, based on the current speed at which water is rising, many more areas on the eastern bank such as Sonia Vihar, Bhajanpura, Seelampur, Shahdara, parts of Mayur Vihar, Ashok Nagar, Gandhi Nagar, Shastri Nagar, Geeta Colony, Laxmi Nagar, Shakarpur, Akshardham, Ganesh Nagar, Pandav Nagar, Samaspur and Chilla may get flooded,” said Rawat.

Prof AK Gosain from IIT Delhi, whose team worked on Delhi’s new drainage master plan, said rampant floods will only occur if embankments fail. He said there was no such breach recorded so far.

“During the 1978 floods, the western side of the embankment was breached which led to the entire region around Model Town being submerged. Similarly, if the eastern side of embankments are crossed now, the low lying Shahdara belt will be flooded. A forecast on what areas are going to be flooded will have to be based on the vulnerability of the embankments,” he added.

Read here: Low-lying parts of Yamuna’s northern, eastern banks in Delhi hit; rescue ops on

To be sure, this is not the first time that water levels in Yamuna breached the 207 metres mark since 1978. The threshold was crossed twice --- first in 2010 when the water level reached 207.11m and in 2013, when it touched 207.32 metres. No major floods were reported in the city on the last two occasions.

An Irrigation and Flood Control (I&FC) department official said the gates of the 12 major drains which outflow into the Yamuna were closed, and embankments being strengthened to prevent further inflow of water into residential pockets. “Teams of engineers are identifying vulnerable points in the river embankments and are fortifying them with sang bags,” the official said.