CCP asked to make sewage collection plan

Panaji: Acting on findings by the Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB), the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) has directed the Corporation of the City of Panaji (CCP) to prepare and submit a time-bound action plan for the collection, treatment and disposal of sewage.
Data published in the GSPCB’s report for the year 2014-15 indicated high bio-chemical oxygen demand (BOD) levels in the River Mandovi on account of the discharge of untreated or partially-treated sewage into it.
The CPCB has also directed the GSPCB—under Section 18(1)b of the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974—to instruct the concerned authorities to develop infrastructure for sewage management.
“The municipal authority, along with other concerned authorities, shall prepare a time-bound action plan to effect proper collection, treatment and disposal of sewage. Such a plan shall be submitted to the GSPCB, with a copy to the CPCB, within 90 days,” CPCB chairman Arun Kumar Mehta said in a letter to the city corporation.
The CPCB has already assessed sewage generation and treatment capacities for India’s urban population for the year 2015 and has found that cities and towns have not yet created adequate systems for sewage collection and treatment. Thus, untreated waste water either runs into rivers or lakes, or inundates land, causing ground water contamination, it observed.
“Sewage generated from Panaji is responsible for the deterioration of River Mandovi’s water quality,” Mehta further stated in his letter to the CCP.
The CPCB, in its earlier letter to the corporation, had chalked out guidelines for the enhancement of open drains carrying sewage.