Data shows reviving cities not easy

NEW DELHI: Less than 10% of municipal solid waste is treated scientifically. Cities and towns are equipped to treat little over 5% of the sewage generated everyday. Quality of sewage treatment is barely 3%. And on an average people get water supply for only three hours a day. These are the dismal realities of the cities and towns which are supposed to be urban India's main growth engines.

These also point to how the Centre and states have a tough task ahead at a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi is launching an ambitious scheme of rejuvenating 500 cities and towns in the next 10 years.

Sources said the government, which is concerned with the ground realities in cities and towns, is keen to bring about a change and that is the main objective behind the new scheme, AMRUT. "Under this mission each of the 500 cities will have to come out with their service level improvement plan (SLIP). These plans shall bring out clearly a gap analysis and actions to be taken to bench mark critical components such as water supply, solid waste and sewage management. The municipal bodies will also have to improve their efficiency in collecting revenue," said a government source.

According to an analysis done by the urban development ministry for 1,405 cities and towns, there is huge gap between what is ideal condition and the actual national average. For example, while ideally per capita water supply should be 135 litres per person per day , on an average urban people get only 69.1 litres. Moreover, cities and towns fail badly in recovering the cost in water supply . "The efficiency in collection of charges related to water supply is less than 60%," said a source.

The government report also highlights how the coverage of sewage network is only 12.2% and the collection efficiency of sewage network is also barely 10%. Though the need to recycle sewage for reuse has been talked much, at present it's only 4%.