Editorial
Recovering all those city canals
Proper, quick demarcation is a must
IT does not surprise anyone that the nearly fifty canals which once used to flow through the nation's capital are today in a dying state. The absence of surprise stems from the fact that over the past several years these canals have stealthily and gradually been encroached upon, to a point where most of them are in very real danger of dying out. And yet, given the serious steps that were taken in 2004 to recover the canals, things ought to have been looking up at this point. WASA undertook a move to recover no fewer than 26 of the 43 canals that had been identified as being in the grip of encroachers; and as a matter of fact quite a spurt of activity was noticed at the time about a recovery of the canals.
Over the past many months, however, matters have clearly come to a standstill. With little follow-up action by the authorities once the recovery is done, the canals revert to encroachment and so are subjected to a fresh spate of unlawful occupation. It is here that the government's efforts to reclaim the canals have regularly fallen flat. No excavation of the canals is undertaken once they are recovered. At the same time, no concrete and focused moves have been made for a demarcation of the canals, which in turn has meant that monitoring of them has been conspicuous by its absence. In other words, governmental activity around the canals has been defined more by half-heartedness than any serious attention to public welfare. Obviously, the repercussions are noticeable; and because they are, it now becomes necessary for some purposeful steps to be taken about getting back control of the canals in the public interest. Happily for citizens, the move made by a parliamentary committee in this regard comes none too soon. The body has asked the land ministry to go into the job of demarcating 43 canals in the capital as a first step towards recovering them from encroachers. It is a job which, therefore, should now be taken up in earnest.
That essentially means that not only should the demarcation be done but also that it should be done in a swift, sustained manner. Once that is over, follow-up steps such as keeping the canals from falling back into the hands of encroachers will become necessary. The chairman of the parliamentary committee has spoken of asking the authorities to secure the banks of the canals with concrete. We think it is a constructive suggestion which must be worked on. And then comes the matter of prosecuting those (and in this category come the city corporation and government departments themselves as well as individuals) who have been grabbing the canals with impunity over the years. Unless there is penalisation, the danger of the canals again being targeted by encroachers will remain.
This time round, let there be evidence that the authorities are serious about the canals, unless of course they have somehow given up on the idea as a lost cause.
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