Uttarakhand rain stops Ganga water supply to Ghaziabad, Noida

GHAZIABAD: Ganga water supply in Ghaziabad and Noida was affected over the weekend after the closure of the Upper Ganga Canal barrage in Haridwar for desilting work following heavy rain in Uttarakhand.
Massive deposition of silt in the canal forced the Uttar Pradesh Jal Board to close the barrage gates.
"Supply to Ghaziabad and Noida, which has a daily demand of 360 million litres per day of Ganga water, was stopped on Sunday as the canal was closed to carry out de-silting exercise" said R K Agarwal, in-charge, Ganga Jal Water treatment plant, Pratap Vihar.
Although officials claimed that supply had resumed from Monday, about 12 lakh people in Noida and eight lakh in Ghaziabad did not receive Ganga water.
The Ganga Jal canal is the lifeline for close to 20 lakh residents of Ghaziabad and Noida.
Ram Naresh Agarwal of Vasundhara, Sector 4, said, "On Sunday there was no water supply and the condition was no better on Monday morning either. We were told that the Ganga canal has been closed."
"Since the water is used by residents even for drinking purpose we had to buy bottled water after our tank went dry. Had we been informed earlier we would have stored water," said Rajiv Singh of Vasundhara Sector 5.
According to UP irrigation department officials, the Ganga canal from Haridwar to Dasna can carry silt up to 5,000 particles per million (ppm) but because of the rain the silt content in the water exceeded 11,000ppm. "We could not have allowed 30 cusecs of water in the canal with such heavy silt content and it urgently needed de-silting. So we had to close down the canal," said an irrigation department official.
Ganga water is channelled into a canal which brings it to Dasna. The water is then carried to the Pratap Vihar plant for treatment via a 19-km pipeline. About 240 million litres per day (MLD) of water is then supplied to Noida and 120MLD to Vasundhara, Indirapuram, Vaishali and Kaushambhi in Ghaziabad.