The desilting of nullahs has turned into a political blame game on Wednesday when the mayor of the city showed satisfaction over ongoing work however, corporators from the ruling Shiv Sena as well as the Opposition pointed out rampant discrepancies in the cleaning work. The objections are threefold over the slow speed of work, contractors transporting more debris and less silt and pilling the cleaned silt on the city's streets.
The administration reports that 50 per cent desilting work of the 276 km major nullahs has been completed. However, in the BMC general body meeting nullah cleaning discussion turned into a free for all slugfest match.
"The contractors are transporting more debris than silt. BMC pays as per the weight of the mud and thus contractors completed their targets and nullahs remain unclean," said Ravi Raja, opposition leader of the BMC.
BJP corporator Rajshree Shirwadkar said, "The silt piled up on the road for more than a week. Usually, it has to transport within two-three days. But the landowner in the Panvel refused permission to dump silt in his land. Now the silt will again go into the nullahs."
"Up till now, only 35 per cent work has been done. It is not satisfactory. In Bandra, the dumper was just putting silt on the other side of nullah. How can nullah be clean like this?" said Sena Corporator Vishakha Raut.
"In Byculla, all the desilting work is only on paper and log-sheet, but there isn't any desilting done in the underground gutter which will choke it," said Rais Shaikh, group leader of the Samajwadi Party.
There are 714 km nullahs in the city out of which 276 km nullahs are big nullahs. (more than 5 metres of width) BMC is spending around Rs. 150 crores to clean them to keep city flood free in the monsoon.
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