Cleaning of Upper Ganga Canal begins, no water supply till Oct 21: Jal Nigam

At present, Noida supplies 240 million litre per day (MLD) Ganga water to households. The city’s water demand is 250 million litres per day.

Residents may face drinking water problems from September 28 to October 21 as the Uttar Pradesh irrigation department will clean the Upper Ganga Canal that supplies Ganga water to Noida during these days. The Noida authority, however, claimed that there will be no problem as it has 300 tubewells (to get underground water) to supply drinking water.

Ghaziabad , India - September 27 : The reservoir over the Upper Ganga Canal has been facing delays year after year and the project has failed to materialise despite slotted completion by November 2017 in Ghaziabad, India, on Wednesday, September 27, 2017. (Photo by Sakib Ali /Hindustan Times)

At present, Noida supplies 240 million litre per day (MLD) Ganga water to households. The city’s water demand is 250 million litres per day.

“We procure groundwater daily to meet water supply demands of 250 MLD. We mix Ganga water in the groundwater to reduce the hardness of the groundwater. In some areas we mix 90% Ganga water and in other areas, about 70% or 60%. Since there will be no Ganga water supply till October 21, we will procure around 250 MLD groundwater to ensure residents do not face any problem related to drinking water,” said Samakant Shrivastava, senior project engineer of the Noida authority.

Cleaning of Upper Ganga canal that originates from Haridwar and passes through Muzaffarnagar, Ghaziabad and Bulandshahr is an annual affair. Residents face water problems each year during this period when the canal is cleaned.

In October last year, the authority had to supply water through tankers in sectors 21, 25 and 26 because of supply shortage from tubewells.

“The Noida authority every year claims that there will be no problem of drinking water during the canal maintenance. But we face problems such as low water pressure, short supply and muddy water during this period. The authority should build a Ganga water reservoir to meet water demands during the cleaning period. Groundwater is hard and salty. We cannot drink it even after is purified by the RO system,” said Dinesh Singh, a Sector 26 resident.

The Noida authority said they will ensure that the residents do not face problems in any colony.

“We have issued a public notice that there will be low water pressure problems in some areas during the period when the canal is cleaned. But we will try to ensure that residents face minimum problems. We will be prompt in attending to complaints about supply,” Shrivastava said.