The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government has planned to legitimise an illegal depot with 1,000 state-run buses currently eating into and polluting 60 acres of ecologically-fragile Yamuna riverbed.

The Delhi High Court has already ordered the relocation of the depot, built at a cost of Rs 61 crore, and a contempt of court proceeding is already on against the government for delay in action.

To bypass this court order, the AAP government wants to sacrifice this vast swathe — as big as 10 football fields — by changing its land use from ‘river and water body’ to ‘transportation’ to grant a permanent, legal tag to a fortnight facility meant to park 300 buses for the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

The Delhi government wants to legitimise the Millennium Bus Depot on the Yamuna riverbed, moving against the high court order

The government move may bring some relief to the transport department as it plans to add more buses, to check spiraling air pollution, to the existing fleet of 6,000 has been held up for lack of space, but raises serious questions on the intent to revive the near-dead river.

Arvind Kejriwal in his previous tenure as chief minister had himself ordered on January 15, 2014 , under court pressure, the relocation of Millennium Bus Depot to develop a recreational area and rejuvenate the river.

The Centre, which owns the land, has already once said no to any change of land use of the plot.

The Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC), in fact, gave an undertaking to the court that the facility abutting Ring Road and NH-24 would be trifurcated and shifted out at a cost of Rs 300 crore by October 2014.

The government plans to make massive concrete structures and facilities such as CNG stations permanent at a time when the court has questioned government authorities for the delay and has fixed August 20 deadline for freeing the already shrinking floodplain of this encroachment.

The AAP plans to set up another flashpoint with the Centre, which owns much of the land in the city. The Delhi Development Authority (DDA), which comes under the Union Urban Development Ministry, has provided, under court pressure, alternative sites so that encroaching and polluting depot could be shifted out.

DDA has handed over three parcels of land at Rohini, Sarai Kale Khan and Narela to the DTC for shifting of the depot. A fourth site of over 16 acres near Anand Vihar is in final stages of being transferred.

Encroachment of floodplains damages river ecosystems, reduces groundwater recharge, and causes flash floods. The depot, which has been operating in violation of a high court order since March 2013, also pollutes the river channel with grease and chemicals discharged during maintenance of buses and functioning of a logistics centre, two CNG-filling stations, and workshops.

AAP’s move to change land use does not hold much water. In September 2012, the court while gearing a writ petition asked the government to ensure relocation unless there was a change of land use through public hearing in six months.

The government failed to change the land use in the window given and the depot became illegal. The court is now hearing a plea seeking contempt of court proceedings against the Delhi government.

The National Green Tribunal has stayed all land use change proposals involving land in river zone.

“On Monday, we will file an urgent appeal before the high court and seek another six-month window to approach the DDA for changing the plot’s land use. The earlier delay in land-use change was because a dispute over ownership of the land,” a top DTC official told Mail Today.

He said the government was purchasing 10,000 buses to scale-up public transport in Delhi and there already is shortage of land to park these buses.

River expert Himanshu Thakkar, however, termed the government move a plain land grab.

“It’s preposterous that the AAP government, which came to power on an anti-corruption plank, of which CWG 2010 was a key target, wants to make the illegal bus depot permanent in the riverbed. It is outright illegal,” he said.

CSE supports government on retention plan

By Darpan Singh in New Delhi

The Delhi government believes the only way to reduce car usage and bring down rising air pollution in the city is to scale-up public transport. And retaining the Millennium Bus Depot in the Yamuna riverbed is a price that has to be paid.

The river zone (zone O) spread in 9,700 hectares in Delhi is gravelly threatened by encroachment. The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) has in the past sought to shrink the river zone by half to legitimise the illegal colonies it first allowed to mushroom for obvious reasons. But the NGT has stayed the move.

The Delhi government claims it will take all precautions to ensure the depot does not harm the river

The river zone is 54-km-long and a maximum of 3-km-wide. Its shrinkage also weakens Delhi’s war on air pollution, and means reduction in groundwater recharge area — a severe blow to a city facing sharp depletion of groundwater table.

But advocacy group Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) has come out in AAP’s support on this matter.

Senior expert at CSE Anumita Roy Chowdhury said: “The floodplain is critical to Delhi’s environment and needs to be protected. But we at the CSE believe the depot should not be removed. The removal will not help. We also believe that the government should take all corrective measures to ensure the depot does not pollute the river.”

Anumita said the issue has to be treated differently.

“We should not let two environmental objectives clash with each other. We have to find a way out. The point here is that the whole scaling-up of bus transport in Delhi has slowed down due to adequate land for parking. This has to change if we are serious about containing the ever spiraling air pollution in Delhi.”

The Delhi government is committed to purchasing 10,000 buses.

“But the DDA and other agencies concerned have not been able to commit land for them,” she said.

The government claims it will take all precautions to ensure the depot does not harm the river further.

“In about 10 acres of land, a government agency is already doing extensive plantation. But make no mistake, we will go by what the court says,” said a senior Delhi government official.

The Delhi government had allowed DTC to build the depot during the 2010 Commonwealth Games for temporary parking of 300 buses. But it became a sprawling, permanent depot with a number of facilities.