Skip to main content

Highly polluted in downstream, Sabarmati riverfront no model: Pune urban rivers dialogue told

 
A recent dialogue on urban rivers, held in Pune, has reached the conclusion that the much-hyped Gujarat’s Sabarmati Riverfront Project in Ahmedabad cannot be considered a model for other cities to follow, as a similar project, planned for Vadodara, the state’s cultural capital, has been “dropped” following public outcry.
Participating in the dialogue, a presentation by Neha Sarwate, a planner from Vadodara, revealed that the Sabarmati model was adopted by the Vadodara Municipal Corporation to develop its Vishwamitri river, passing through the city. But as Vadodara citizens “raised a series of issues and started a campaign proposing alternative ways of developing the river”, the city authorities were forced to cancel it.
Organized jointly by the well-known environmental advocacy group, South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People (SANDRP) and a high-profile NGO, Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), during the dialogue on urban rivers Gujarat’s top expert Bimal Patel, who originally conceptualized the Sabarmati project, admitted that Sabarmati is “not an example of river rejuvenation project.”
Suggesting that in the original plan for the Sabarmati riverfront project did not visualize taking water from Narmada, Patel reportedly told the dialogue that it did not even involve “cleaning the river, but only transferring the sewage downstream and channelizing the river with concrete embankments”, adding, no ecological alternative was considered either.
Bimal Patel
Patel also admitted that Sabarmati river, as of today, “is no more a river with flowing water but a lake with stagnant water, that too sourced from Narmada river.” Agreeing that Ahmedabad has no right over the Narmada water, he said, “The project only happened because it has a mass appeal “many people – lakhs of people, wanted it to happen”.
The sharp admission has come against the backdrop of a Central Water Commission report identifying Vautha, a spot downstream of Sabaramti before the river merges into the sea in the Gulf of Khambhat, as one of the dozen most contamination sites across India requiring "immediate attention to remedy the river waters as far as drinking purpose concern." 
Ironically, the Government of India, over the last four years, has considered Sabarmati riverfront development as a model for other cities to become “smart.” The “model’s” highlights, propagated by the officialdom, include features like concrete walkways and parks along Sabarmati, but there is no word on what happens to the river in the downstream of Ahmedabad.
Meanwhile, well-known water resources expert Shripad Dharmadhikary, one of the participants at the dialogue, has commented, “Attracted by this, many cities in the country – including Pune – have decided to go for riverfront development using this very model, and in fact, are also engaging the very same consultant who designed the Sabarmati project, HCP Design Planning and Management Pvt Ltd.”
Officially envisaged as “a comprehensive development of approximately 11 kilometres of length on both the banks of the Sabarmati to bring about an overall environmental improvement, social upliftment and sustainable development along the riverfront”, Dharmadhikary says, “In reality, what the project has done is to convert these 11 km of the river in the city into a large elongated lake, with a barrage at Vasana holding the water.”
Shripad Dharmadhikary
He adds, “Sabarmati has little water of its own, and what is standing right now in the ‘riverfront’ is the water from river Narmada, emptied into the Sabarmati from the Narmada main canal at the upstream end. This water is from the Sardar Sarovar dam, whose construction despite displacing lakhs of people and destroying the environment had been justified for the need to take waters to the dry farms of Gujarat.”
Amidst news that Narmada waters will not be available for Sabarmati next year onwards, Darmadhikary says, now the project planning to sell some 15-20% of the space along the river to big corporates and star facilities to make the project “self-financed”. He wonders, when, after next year, no Narmada waters will be available for Sabarmati, whether the 11 km stretch would be filled with “with Ahmedabad’s treated sewage.”

Comments

TRENDING

Dalit rights and political tensions: Why is Mevani at odds with Congress leadership?

While I have known Jignesh Mevani, one of the dozen-odd Congress MLAs from Gujarat, ever since my Gandhinagar days—when he was a young activist aligned with well-known human rights lawyer Mukul Sinha’s organisation, Jan Sangharsh Manch—he became famous following the July 2016 Una Dalit atrocity, in which seven members of a family were brutally assaulted by self-proclaimed cow vigilantes while skinning a dead cow, a traditional occupation among Dalits.  

Global NGO slams India for media clampdown during conflict, downplays Pakistan

A global civil rights group, Civicus has taken strong exception to how critical commentaries during the “recent conflict” with Pakistan were censored in India, with journalists getting “targeted”. I have no quarrel with the Civicus view, as the facts mentioned in it are all true.

Whither SCOPE? Twelve years on, Gujarat’s official English remains frozen in time

While writing my previous blog on how and why Narendra Modi went out of his way to promote English when he was Gujarat chief minister — despite opposition from people in the Sangh Parivar — I came across an interesting write-up by Aakar Patel, a well-known name among journalists and civil society circles.

Remembering Vijay Rupani: A quiet BJP leader who listened beyond party lines

Late evening on June 12, a senior sociologist of Indian origin, who lives in Vienna, asked me a pointed question: Of the 241 persons who died as a result of the devastating plane crash in Ahmedabad the other day, did I know anyone? I had no hesitation in telling her: former Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani, whom I described to her as "one of the more sensible persons in the BJP leadership."

Unchecked urbanisation, waste dumping: Study warns of 'invited disaster' as khadi floods threaten half of Surat

An action research report, “Invited Disaster: Khadi Floods in Surat City”, published by two civil rights groups, Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti and the People's Union for Civil Liberties, Surat, states that nearly half of Gujarat's top urban conglomerate—known for its concentration of textile and diamond polishing industries—is affected by the dumping of debris and solid waste, along with the release of treated and untreated sewage into the khadis (rivulets), thereby increasing the risk of flood disaster.

Polymath academy or echo chamber? A personal take on knowledge, control, and WhatsApp moderation

A few months back, I was made a member of a WhatsApp group called Polymath Academy. Frankly, I didn’t know what the word polymath meant until its administrator, veteran Gujarat-based sociologist Vidyut Joshi — with whom I have been interacting since the mid-1990s when he was with the Gandhi Labour Institute — told me it refers to a person with an exceptional academic record.

Two decades on, hunger still haunts Gujarat: Survey exposes stark gap behind poverty claims

A Niti Aayog report , released about two years ago, estimated that in Gujarat — which our powers-that-be have long considered a model state — 11.66% of people are "multidimensionally poor," a term referring to an index that seeks to estimate "multiple and simultaneous deprivations" at the household level across three macro categories: health, education, and living standards.

English proficiency for empowerment: Modi’s SCOPE vision contrasts Amit Shah’s remark

While Union Home Minister Amit Shah may have asserted that soon a time would come when those speaking English in the country would “feel ashamed”, it is ironic that Narendra Modi, when he was Gujarat chief minister, had launched what was called the SCOPE programme, actively involving the University of Cambridge to provide opportunities to the youth of Gujarat to "become not just job seekers but job creators (entrepreneurs)."

Whither whistleblower concerns? Air India crash: Govt of India report suggests human error

Is the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Government of India, seeking to bail out Boeing in its preliminary report released recently despite the top MNC's whistleblower concerns ? It would seem so, if the Ministry's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau's (AAIB's) preliminary findings into the catastrophic crash of Air India’s Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, registration VT-ANB, which went down shortly after takeoff from Ahmedabad on 12 June 2025, killing all 241 on board and 19 on the ground, is any indication.