Delhi Budget: Arvind Kejriwal mounts on ‘garbage mountains’ for 2024
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, March 22: On a high after winning the municipal elections in the national capital, Chief Minister with Delhi Budget is seeking to further cement his hold in the national capital in the run up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Three landfill sites, which are known as Delhi’s eyesores, have been aimed at for elimination before the 2024 Lok Sabha elections in the Budget for the national capital.
Delhi Finance Minister Kailash Gahlot presented the Rs 78,800-crore Budget for financial year 2023-24 in the Assembly on Wednesday. Delhi Budget presentation was delayed by a day after the Ministry of Home Affairs had raised queries on proposals for expenditure on advertisements.
Gahlot proposed that landfill sites, which have taken shapes of garbage mountains, will be completely removed within a fixed timeline before 2024 — the Okhla landfill by December 2023, Bhalswa by March 2024, and Ghazipur by December 2024. Incidentally, Delhi lieutenant governor Vinai Kumar Saxena also had visited the landfill sites along with Union Minister for Road and Surface Transport Nitin Gadkari and it was stated that garbage would be used in road constructions to cut down the length of the landfill sites in due course of time.
Delhi Budget has proposed an outlay of Rs 850 crore, which will be provided to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) for flattening landfills, said Gahlot in the Assembly. He also proposed a six-point action plan to clean Yamuna River. He stated that removing three mountains of garbage is the focus in Delhi government’s budget. Besides, Delhi will treat 890 million gallons of sewage a day by March 2024, which is a massive increase over 373 MGD in 2015, added Gahlot
The minister also stated that the local bodies will be given financial assistance of Rs 8,241 crore in 2023-24 fiscal, while stressing that “every possible help will be given to MCD to remove three mountains of garbage in Delhi”.
While the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Delhi has so far built an election plank on the basis of its education model and free electricity and water, the ruling party in the national capital is now shifting to gear to lay claim on the beautification of the national capital. The garbage mountains which are sites of fires in the national capital have been major sources of air pollution for years. Also, Delhi pollution is largely attributed to dust.
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