New Delhi: The Delhi Jal Board's Director of Quality Control, Sanjay Sharma, took a bath in the water taken out from the Yamuna river on Sunday to prove that chemicals sprayed in the river were non-toxic.
This comes after he was berated by Bharatiya Janta Party West Delhi MP Parvesh Verma and party leader Tajinder Singh Bagga on Friday. Verma had shown up at the banks of the river where the DBJ officials were working and claimed that the chemicals sprayed in the river were "toxic", he further challenged Sharma to take a dip in the water.
To reassure devotees who will come to the ghats for the holy dip, Sharma took a bath in the water, while people surrounding him applauded.
The DJB official said, "The chemical being sprayed is not harmful at all. This is a non-toxic, food-grade chemical used in food items as well as cosmetics. I welcome the Purvanchali devotees to take a dip in the river without any fear". On the rumours spread about the defoamer, he said that those were lies and that it was non-toxic.
He said that this isn't a message to Pravesh Verma as he is an honourable MP. "This is a message to the people of Delhi," He said, asserting that the chemical is eco-friendly and does not have any effect on the skin.
The BJP leader shouted at the director and called him "Besharam" (shameless) and "ghatiya aadmi" (cheap person) after he showed up with Bagga. A video of the heated interaction was later posted by DJB vice-chairman AAP MLA Saurabh Bharadwaj on Twitter.
According to news agency PTI, the DJB official filed a police complaint against Verma and Bagga for allegedly "intimidating" him while supervising the use of an anti-foaming substance on the Yamuna at Kalindi Kunj.
Sharma filed the complaint with the Kalindi Kunj police station on Friday. In his complaint, he stated that Verma used "very foul language and misbehaved with me. He is also spreading the false propaganda that I along with officers of the DJB are poisoning the water of the Yamuna river".
To deal with the froth formation, the stakeholders including the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), the Upper Yamuna River Board (UYRB), the UP Irrigation Department, the Delhi Jal Board (DJB), the Delhi Irrigation and Flood Control Department, and the Delhi Pollution Control Committee (DPCC) had decided that eco-friendly anti-surfactant would be sprayed from October 25 onwards till Chhath Puja from boat-mounted sprayers.
Aside from this, other measures to control the froth formation would include operations of a barrage gate to avoid/minimise free fall at Okhla Barrage.
(With Agency Inputs)