Follow Us
Sumedha Sharma
From a sleepy town, Gurugram, in just two decades, went on to become a cosmopolitan city, a cyber giant, auto hub, entertainment destination, luxury island and what not. These are a few things that sum up the city’s growth story, but of late, its toxic level of air pollution, traffic mess, depleting water table and fast approaching aqua doom, unchecked constructions, ailing civic infrastructure, rising mound of untreated garbage, mindless chopping of trees, is what best defines Gurugram.
What ails city
It symbolises the fall of the city owing to uncontrolled urbanisation today. It is not that we don’t realise that the city is dying and drowning in the by-products of its commercialisation and expansion, the problem is we choose to shut our eyes to the catastrophe. We have an endless list of problems that threaten the very existence of residents but do not have a concrete solution of even a plan to deal with them.
It was in 2017, when during an environment conclave hosted by the city, a document, jointly prepared by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) and Gurgaon, first cited threats such as fast-depleting groundwater table, high levels of pollution, rising demand for electricity, growing dependence on personal vehicles, poor waste management and enormous pressure on forests. Titled ‘Gurugram: a framework for sustainable development’, the document was released by then Union Minister of State for Urban Development Rao Inderjit Singh that offered many solutions. However, two years down the line, it continues to be a mere document while the city heads on to become a classic example of ‘How not to build a city’.
One of the key aspects that has made Gurugram ‘international’ is air pollution and smog. Often dubbed as a gas chamber, the city according to many independent studies has seen migration of residents in search of cleaner air to breath. Many MNCs are moving out of their offices with foreign employees raising objections. Gurugram was declared the world’s most polluted city in 2018 by IQAir Air Visual and Greenpeace. A hue and cry was raised, but nothing much was done.
Since the last one decade, Gurugram residents have been breathing air that has more than double the annual safe limit of PM 2.5. According to a study by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi (IIT-D), out of all pollutants, the suspended particulate matter (PM) 2.5 has been way above the permissible limit, which is 60 micrograms per cubic metre (µg/m³).
While initially, it was stubble burning by Delhi and Haryana farmers, which was blamed for this catastrophe, but a deeper analysis by experts revealed that the millennium city has paid the price for unplanned concretisation and development. A recent study by the Centre for Science and Environment listed unchecked construction, vehicular emissions and lost greens, as the key reason behind the issue. We know the issue, we know the cause, but so far we have no solution or a plan at hand.
Aqua doom
Gurugram continues to struggle with poor water infrastructure for the last four decades. A city once lush with hundreds of water sources, lakes and recharge zones, has been dubbed as a ‘dark zone’ by the Central Ground Water Authority (CGWA). Composite Water Management Index by Neeti Aayog predicted that Gurugram along with 20 other cities will be left without any groundwater by the end of 2020. At present, city’s groundwater extraction is at 308 per cent, far out-stripping neighbouring Faridabad at 75 per cent, Palwal at 80 per cent and Mewat at 85 per cent. The local administration has got success in dealing with illegal boring, but given the ever-increasing demand, even it has been rendered helpless. One of the major factors that has lead to depletion is lack of optimum recharge even after good monsoons, as a majority of our natural water bodies and recharge zones have been lost because of mindless concretisation. With the alarming decline of 82 per cent in its water table in the last one decade and loss of 389 water bodies in the past 60 years, all thanks to mindless realty boom, the city faces the threat of “aqua-calypse”. While the clock ticks away, the millennium city is yet to wake up to the danger. The only ray of hope in a situation like this is the ambitious Gurujal Project spearheaded by the local administration. As part of its special initiative, the local administration has decided to revive 300 of the identified village ponds and community water bodies across the district starting with 30 in the first phase. As per the revenue records, Gurugram has 644 water bodies on paper, of which a majority have been lost or are damaged beyond repair, while 320 ponds, wherein 250 are in rural and 70 in urban areas, are highly toxic and contaminated, owing to un-checked sewerage and even urban waste discharge, but still have a hope that these can be revived and cater to non-potable water demands and act as groundwater recharges.
Stuck between the defunct Bandhwari Solid Waste Treatment Plant and yet to materialise waste to energy plant, Gurugram has, for almost a decade, been struggling with one of its worst ‘waste nightmare’ epitomised by heaps of stinky waste at Bandhwari. Gurugram, the state’s sole cosmopolitan city, produces almost 1,500 metric tonnes of waste per day with 900 metric tonnes being municipal or domestic waste, while around 600 tonnes being construction and demolition waste.
As per the official records, waste production has doubled in the last one decade, but the city could never match up with waste disposal or treatment. Its only solid waste treatment plant was set up in 2007 and went into operation in 2008. It was to cater to increase in solid waste owing to the urbanisation of Gurugram and Faridabad. However, the unit shut down after a fire broke out in 2013. The fire made the plant defunct, but till date the landfill continues to receive an average of 1,200 metric tonnes of garbage from both Gurugram and Faridabad and we are headed to have NC’s biggest garbage mountain.
Even though the Haryana Government promised to revive the defunct Bandhwari Waste Treatment Plant by June 2019 with Ecogreen’s ambitious energy from waste plant, it’s still under progress.
Lost forest cover, greens
Rampant concretisation, illegal mining, diminishing tree cover lost indigenous flora and fauna, disappearing natural water bodies and rainwater reservoirs is what best describes the Aravallis. The ‘forest’covering 30,000 hectares of south Haryana, spread across five districts of Gurgaon, Faridabad, Mewat, Mahendragarh, and Rewari, is a ghostly shadow of what it was and has been declared the most “degraded” forest range in India by the Wildlife Institute of India (WII). Ironically, the section of forests lying in Delhi and Rajasthan is thriving and has been declared ‘reserved forests’ and turned into sanctuaries, but it’s on its way to extinction in Haryana.
According to the official data, the green cover of Gurugram district is a meagre 8 per cent, while that of Gurugram city is 3 per cent. As per the Forest Department records, other than thousands of trees being illegally chopped across the city and Aravallis over 1,500 trees have been ‘legally’ chopped in the last two years with 7,500 trees having been cut in 2017-18 and 7,200 in 2016-17. This was a steep increase from around 2,200 trees chopped in 2015-16. The trees were chopped with due permissions to build new roads, buildings, underpasses and even giving highway access to various realtors.
Rampant construction
The city has been under-construction since what seems an eternity now. Ask any resident, construction activities are apparently a never-ending phenomena. Be it highways or infrastructure upgrade or foot over bridges, development of new residential sectors or housing projects or rampant illegal constructions in every single lane and street, it has become an inevitable part of our lives. We have for years turned a blind eye thinking it to be an ultimate foundation of chiselling city into a utopian dreamland, but the phenomena is graduating to be one of the biggest menaces threatening with non-reversible, ecological, infrastructural, environmental and even quality of living catastrophe. Construction made Gurugram the biggest dust bowl in NCR. It is identified as the biggest culprit of smog and air pollution. We not only have highest construction activity on at a given hour with over 2,000 approved and average 1,000 illegal constructions under way, but poorest air quality index for most of the days. Though garbage and waste treatment is surely a long pending problem for the city, its C and D waste is the biggest headache for authorities and residents alike. With rampant construction being carried across the city, not only construction material lies uncovered and scattered here and there, but its debris clog everything right from road, green belts to drains and even Aravallis. The biggest problem is the ongoing constructions in residential areas, where out to earn easy money through PGs, people with plots as small as 60 yards and legal permission of just one floor, have gone ahead in erecting seven floors to house tenants.
Crime rate
While figures may vary every quarter, but with Gurugram gaining notoriety as the crime capital, safety is the biggest concern for residents. It’s not just crime against women, but repeated instances of snatchings in certain areas, uncontrolled lift and loot incidents, armed vehicle robberies, vehicle thefts, extortion demands by gangsters and now even small-time goons, instances of road rage and increased cyber crime is what keeps a majority of residents on guard. Home to various heinous crimes, including a few in protected properties such as schools, and now even communal tensions, the millennium city ranks low as far as security is concerned.
High vehicular density
Vehicles are found in abundance in Gurugram. As per records, only 17 per cent of the city residents use public transport for daily travel, while all others are dependent on personal vehicles. Over 50,000 vehicles are added on city’s roads every year and the number of cars entering Gurugram from Delhi daily is more than three times the number of cars registered in Gurugram in 2017. Nearly 900 trucks cross the city every day on expressway. Of Gurugram’s 732-odd square kilometres, about 25 per cent is currently taken up by road space (roughly 220 km), according to a recent survey by the School of Planning and Architecture in New Delhi for the Gurugram Municipal Development Corporation (GMDA). So, no matter how many roads are made, these will never be enough and jams would remain. In city, especially when one is heading to Delhi during peak office hours, especially during late evenings, Sirhaul border or expressway in front of Ambience Mall is the most congested area and every resident has faced the heat of snarls here while trying to make it to their office in time or catching evening flights. Given the quality of fuel used in Indian vehicles, vehicular emissions in Gurugram are always above the red mark and the city is the biggest contributor to air pollution.
Affordable education, medicare
Gurugram is among the most chosen destinations for medical tourism. A home to world class hospitals, an average resident ironically has no access to affordable health facilities. The government health sector is in a shambles struggling with lack of staff and resources, and with no checks in place and a strong hospital insurance nexus, healthcare in Gurugram is an epitome of fleecing people. From being overcharged up to 200 per cent for various facilities to repeated instances of negligence and indifference to mandated subsidised treatment to poor, the health sector surely needs an intervention. Just like hospitals, Gurugram is home to posh, overrated and expensive schools. Government schools are just like the others in the state and a majority of world class schools are reserved for a handful. For an average resident, it is a Herculean task to get admissions and then cough up the hefty fee which is increased perennially.
Join Whatsapp Channel of The Tribune for latest updates.
2
4
5