Activists laid emphasis on the need for an environmental impact assessment to be carried out for every single activity connected with river restoration.
Environmental activists in Pune insisted on a holistic restoration of the Mutha river, not a piecemeal effort, at the second meeting on the proposed restoration project of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Tuesday.
DNA had reported (‘PMC dumps river navigation project’, Dec 17) how river navigation would not be part of the river restoration project, as disclosed by PMC officials in the first meeting of environmental activists on December 16.
The activists, PMC officials and river consultants met at PMC’s Veer Savarkar Bhavan office on Tuesday, where activist Vinod Bodhankar raised objections to the construction of a road in the Mutha river between National Highway-4 and Vitthalwadi temple, running parallel to Sinhagad Road.
He pointed out that while the PMC’s Rs99-crore, river restoration project addressed the 16-km stretch of the Mutha river between Mhatre bridge and Mundhwa, it did not focus on the construction of the road on the river bed near the temple.
“The road construction has narrowed down the river bed drastically and this will cause floods in the area. When the PMC looks at restoring the river, it must do it holistically, not in a piecemeal manner,” Bodhankar said.
Activists presented to the PMC’s additional city engineer, Srinivas Bonala, a list of demands related to river restoration. They laid emphasis on the need for an environmental impact assessment (EIA) to be carried out for every single activity connected with river restoration.
They were also of the opinion that all issues raised by the state irrigation department and the ministry of environment and forests (MOEF) must be cleared before any work commenced. The activists also requested the PMC officials to supply them with certified copies of all approvals connected with the project.
In his address to the media, Bonala said the points raised by the activists would be shared with the irrigation department and all relevant departments of the PMC before arriving at conclusions.
Bonala, who has reconvened a third meeting on December 28, has asked the PMC’s sewage treatment plants (STP) team to make a presentation on the civic body’s comprehensive STP plan.
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