The Delhi government has authorised the construction of additional catchment reservoirs along the Yamuna River to retain excess monsoon water and supplement the city’s drinking water supply. In a review meeting convened by chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday, two such pilot reservoirs were approved.
“Our plan is to store the excess water reaching the Yamuna during the monsoon in these reservoirs and purify it. Once the strategy is proved successful, more such reservoirs will be built to divert excess water from the Yamuna and augment supply in Delhi,” Kejriwal said after the meeting.
The first two prototype reservoirs would cover 479 acres and have a storage capacity of 1,958 million gallons (MG), according to a government official who did not want to be identified.
After evaluating these two projects, the government’s strategy is to build capacity to hold around 32,203 million gallons of floodwaters, according to a government spokesperson.
