The TREADS Initiative with the support of National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) invites you to the fifth talk in the series Water-Centric Master Planning in India on:
Rivers, Riverfronts and ‘Urban Rivers’: Rethinking River Continuum
Friday, 25th October 2024, 3:30 PM IST
Speaker:
Prof. Venkatesh Dutta, Professor, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University, Lucknow
Moderator:
Dr. Srinivas Chokkakula, President and Chief Executive, CPR
This talk will be held online over Zoom.
About the talk:
Many smaller rivers and rivulets in India are disappearing and their watersheds are shrinking at an alarming rate. A river passing through a city is not merely a water channel, it is also a high-value real estate. Several urban development projects and extensions see river edge and floodplains as potential sites for housing, highways, and industries. There are guidelines to demarcate floodplains but it is easier said than done on the ground. Understanding the three-dimensional connectivity of a river to the floodplain, groundwater and its own channel upstream and downstream is very important in developing holistic urban development guidelines. Concretization of riverbanks and its active floodplains impedes river flows, alters water quality, and negatively impacts the river’s biodiversity with eventual demise of the fluvial ecosystem. Contrary to the perception, riverfront development projects have not prevented sewage from entering the river. Further, the city’s water and wastewater crises have escalated due to non-functioning intercepting drains. The urban-centric approach of river management is driven by large civil-engineering projects with more built-landscape and concrete river banks along the urban stretch of a river. The phrase ‘urban river’ is being used to disconnect a river from its upstream and downstream continuum. These areas are ecologically fragile, and restoration work should enrich their natural endowments and viability to remain as living rivers. This talk would explore why integrating nature-based approaches to restore rivers in urban areas is critical. It intends to highlight a necessary shift from the narrow focus on beautification and redevelopment projects towards reconnecting rivers with its floodplains, natural drains and wetlands for a resilient ecosystem.
About the speaker:
Prof. Venkatesh Dutta is an environmental scientist whose work focuses on rivers, wetlands and floodplains. He has been a Fulbright Fellow and a British Chevening Scholar. He has designed several long-term projects on restoration of 75 smaller and lesser-known tributaries of Ganga in Uttar Pradesh using nature-based approaches. He has written extensively on the subject and guided researchers and policy professionals in drafting floodplain zoning regulations, environmental flows criteria for smaller rivers and water quality standards for wetlands. Prof. Dutta served as a member in the drafting committee of State Water Policy 2020 of Uttar Pradesh. He was instrumental in various consultative workshops that led to drafting of the 2019 Groundwater Bill of Uttar Pradesh.
Prof. Dutta has done his doctoral work at the TERI School, New Delhi and Post-Doctoral Research at the School of Public Policy, University of Maryland. He is currently working as Professor at the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, BBAU (Central University), Lucknow.
