While Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit claims that Yamuna cannot be cleaned before the Commonwealth Games, it has emerged that the funds for the Yamuna Action Plan — Rs 624 crore for three states and Rs 327 crore for Delhi, over a period of 5 years — are still underutilised.

Responding to a Parliament question on Wednesday, the Minister of Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh admitted the Yamuna remains dirty. “Water quality of Yamuna between Tajewala and Palla in Haryana is acceptable. But the stretch in the vicinity of Delhi — downstream of Wazirabad and upstream of Okhla, and some stretches of Uttar Pradesh, exceeds the standards in terms of bio-chemical oxygen demand of three mg/l,” said Ramesh.

While progress on YAP Phase-II is crawling, Delhi Jal Board says they will catch up by 2010. “All the works, including sewer rehabilitation, are in full progress. We should be able to make up for the lost time. We should be able to finish YAP-II by February next year,” DJB CEO Ramesh Nigam told Newsline. This will mean Delhi utilising hundreds of crores over this year.

In February this year, the report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science and Technology, Environment and Forests also pulled up the Delhi government for not utilising YAP-II money. “We express serious concern over the tardy progress of the project and the low utilisation of funds,” the report said. “Though there is no dearth of funds, no satisfactory results have been achieved,” it said.