Downstream Portion Of River Highly Polluted Lucknow: Hinting at the dangerous level of pollutants dissolved in the Gomti riverbed, UP Jal Nigam on Tuesday informed the Parliamentary Committee that around 37 million litres per day of untreated sewage is flowing into the river. Even though the official figures don’t ring an alarming bell at the moment, few LMC officials said the extent of untreated sewage flowing into the river is much more than what is being quoted by the Jal Nigam. The Parliamentary Standing Committee of Rajya Sabha on Science and Technology, Environment and Forests comprising five members was in the state capital to review the pollution level of the Gomti. The members included chairman of the committee, T Subbarami Reddy, Ranjan Prasad Yadav, Rabinarayan Mohapatra, Alok Tewari and Pradeep Tamta. Officials told TOI that in Lucknow, around 401 million litres of sewage is being daily disposed. Out of this, only 363 MLD is getting treated at the sewage treatment plants, while the rest of 37 MLD remains untreated. At present, Lucknow has two sewage treatment plants: one at Bhawara and the other at Daulatganj. Bhawara has capacity of treating around 345 MLD of sewage, while that of Daulatganj is just 56 MLD. The committee visited Kudiyaghat and discussed about the existing problems in the water with the principal secretary (environment), VN Garg and officials of UP Jal Nigam, UP Pollution Control Board and LMC. The Jal Nigam also gave a presentation on the pollution level of the river to the committee. BJP MP from city Lalji Tandon was also present in the meeting. Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) is the standard unit to determine the pollution level in a water body. Officials said that the river water coming from Sitapur (upstream) is pollution free and it remains quite clean till Gaughat in Chowk area with 3.1 mg/litre of water. The water condition starts deteriorating soon after the river enters the main city. The BOD level near Mohan Meakin brewery near Daliganj area is as high as 4.5 mg/ litre, it increases up to 6.4 mg/litre in Nishatganj area, 7.9 mg/litre at Gomti barrage and then the BOD level is alarmingly high and maximum at Pipraghat with about 9.1 mg/ litre. A senior LMC official said, “This is almost three times higher than the normal level, which is quite dangerous. The committee has asked us to think about the probable ways to combat the pollution and how we can effectively control the sewage flowing into the riverbed.” He also diverted attention towards the large chunk of sewage that directly passes into the river through open drains in the city. “While we know the amount of untreated sewage flowing into the river every day, no one can imagine the actual amount of sewage passing through open drains in the city, which makes the condition even worse,” he added. LMC said it is currently working on connecting all the households within the city with the main sewage treatment plant under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission scheme. A senior official said, “While the laying of sewerage pipes is almost complete in the old city, the main challenge is to connect it to all the households. The initial target was to complete the laying down of pipes and then connecting it to the households by 2013, but it has now been shifted to 2014.” The committee suggested certain solutions while assessing the river water to plug in the gaps in execution of the scheme and speedy functioning of the solid waste treatment plant in the city. The other solution is to remove the slum areas dwelling on either sides of the riverbank in some areas. Officials said that they were largely responsible for the passing of sewage directly into the river. The panel was on a five-day visit in UP from January 18-22 to assess the water quality and pollution level of various rivers flowing in the state, especially Ganga.