The latest disclosures in parliament on the Yamuna’s toxic state inside Delhi reveal a troubling truth: despite Rs 5,536 crore spent over recent years, the river remains dangerously polluted. The most uncomfortable part of this reality is that the Yamuna arrives in Delhi relatively clean, but leaves it poisoned.

This is not a natural phenomenon. It is a civic and governance failure of staggering proportions.

Government data shows that between January and July 2025, the Yamuna entered Delhi at Palla with biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) between 2.5–4 mg/l and dissolved oxygen (DO) of 6–9.5 mg/l – well within healthy limits. Yet, as it moves across the capital, the river’s water quality collapses. Why? Because Delhi continues to release far more sewage and industrial waste into the river than it can possibly treat.

As of August 2025, the city faced a 414 million litres per day (MLD) of sewage treatment shortfall. In simple terms, a substantial portion of wastewater generated by Delhi’s two crore residents bypasses treatment plants entirely and flows directly into the Yamuna through the city’s drains.

In addition, many industrial areas still operate without functional common effluent treatment plants, a fact repeatedly noted in the Delhi Pollution Control Committee’s statutory reviews . The city also generates 11,862 tonnes of solid waste daily, of which around 91 tonnes remain unmanaged, with much of it ending up in stormwater drains and along the floodplains, ultimately flowing into the river.

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This is a perfect storm of untreated sewage, unchecked industrial effluents and unmanaged waste. It is also a reflection of deeply fragmented governance. Multiple agencies – municipal corporations, the Delhi Jal Board, pollution control committees and the National Mission for Clean Ganga – operate without unified accountability, as the Comptroller and Auditor General’s audit of Delhi’s water pollution control underscores. 

Large projects get announced, sanctioned, and occasionally inaugurated, but too many remain stuck in delays, litigation, land disputes, or slow execution.

The crisis is not limited to Delhi alone. The Central Pollution Control Board’s latest national review identifies 296 polluted river stretches across 271 rivers in 32 states and Union Territories, marking a widespread pattern of urban river degradation across India. 

The ministry’s recent admission in parliament that no scientific study is being conducted on the health impacts faced by communities using polluted river water raises even deeper concerns. How do we protect public health if we are not even measuring health outcomes?

The way forward

Yet, the Yamuna’s plight also reveals something else: the limits of top-down environmental governance. Money, by itself, cannot clean a river. Announcements do not revive ecosystems. And bureaucratic structures, left to themselves, do not reform.

Also read: India’s Air Quality Row: How The Govt is Consistently Rejecting Data And Science

This is where citizens must step in – not as protestors, but as partners and watchdogs.

For one, Delhi’s residents must demand realtime transparency. The city should have open dashboards displaying sewage treatment plant performance, drain pollution loads, and water quality metrics along the length of the Yamuna. 

If industries discharge untreated waste, citizens must mobilise pressure through complaint portals, RTIs and social media. Citizen groups, RWAs, schools and colleges should jointly track drains in their neighbourhoods – the very conduits through which untreated sewage enters the river.

Moreover, households must take responsibility for what leaves their homes. Excessive detergent use, illegal sewer connections, disposal of puja materials, or dumping waste near drains –  all contribute to river pollution. And on a larger scale, citizens must push elected representatives to prioritise sewage networks, Common Effluent Treatment Plants, and enforcement over cosmetic riverfront beautification.

The global playbook is clear. The Thames in London – once declared biologically dead – was revived through enforcement, accountability and relentless citizen pressure. The Rhine, once Europe’s dirtiest river, was recovered through transnational coordination and public demand. Seoul’s Cheonggyecheon was transformed only when citizens refused to accept degradation as inevitable.

Delhi must learn the same lesson: a river is not cleaned by budgets, it is cleaned by governance, and governance improves when citizens insist on it.

The Yamuna’s decline is not merely an environmental tragedy. It is a moral one. A civilisation that once revered its rivers as lifelines now tolerates their decay in silence.

If the river enters Delhi clean, it is Delhi’s responsibility to ensure it leaves clean. The Yamuna is not just flowing water; it is a mirror. And today, it shows us exactly who we are and who we must become.

Sanjeev Jha is a water and sanitation practitioner and public policy analyst focused on evidence-based urban governance and sustainable environmental solutions.

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