When was Ganga Action Plan started?

Last Updated : 13 Feb, 2024

Ganga Action Plan was announced in the year 1985 by the Ministry of Environment and Forests. It was the first River Action Plan which was introduced to improve the quality of water by interception, diversion, and treatment of domestic sewage system. Ganga Action Plan was started on January 14th, 1986 during the tenure of the Rajiv Gandhi government to collect, reduce, reuse, and recycle the wastes in the Ganga River. GAP is 100% centrally sponsored. As Ganga became the 5th most polluted river in India, it was a great step to clean the Ganga River.

In this article, we shall discuss the Ganga Action Plan in detail.

Ganga Action Plan

Table of Content

What is the Ganga Action Plan?
Objectives Of The Ganga Action Plan
Role Of Outside Agencies In Ganga Action Plan
Ganga Action Plan Achievements
Reasons for Failure of Ganga Action Plan
Frequently Asked Questions

Ganga Action Plan: Overview

Key Facts ad Figures
Name of the Project	Ganga Action Plan (GAP)
Launch Year	1986
Prepared by	Ministry of Environment and Forest based on the Survey of the Ganga Basin by the CPCB
Implementation Phases	Phase-1 (1986-2000) Phase-2 (approved from 1993-1996)
Objectives	Pollution abetment and improving the water quality of the Ganga river.

What is the Ganga Action Plan?

The Ganga Action Plan is a centrally sponsored scheme to improve the quality of water in the Ganga River. As it is a 100% centrally sponsored scheme, it means that the entire cost of the project is borne by the central government. Under this plan, Ganga was declared the national river of India, and The National River Ganga Basin Authority (NRGBA) was also formed. The Prime Minister of India is the chairman of NRGBA.

Phases Of Implementation Of Ganga Action Plan

The Ganga Action Plan was implemented in 2 phases. These 2 phases were as follows:

Phase I

Phase I of GAP was implemented in 3 states first i.e. UP, West Bengal and Bihar, and it started in the year 1985. It ended in the year 2000.
The implementation of phase I cost 462 crores to the GoI.
According to a survey conducted by CPCB, the solid waste from 25 class – 1 towns was found to be 1340 MLD (million liters per day).
Only 882 MLD of the waste could be reduced in the Phase I due to shortage of funds.
Sewage treatment capacity of 865 MLD was developed under this phase

Phase II

Ganga Action Plan was implemented in 7 states i.e. Uttarakhand, UP, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Haryana, and Delhi in the second phase. The second phase also extended this plan to all the tributaries of the Ganges such as Yamuna, Damodar and Gomti.
Phase II started from 2001.
A separate scheme was also introduced to implement this plan to other rivers of India. This was done under the National River Conservation Plan.
Later the GAP was brought under Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF). The Central Ganga Authority (CGA) was also formed under the 1986.
This plan was later shifted to 70% and 30% model between Central and State governments.

Objectives Of The Ganga Action Plan

Following are the objectives of Ganga Action Plan:

To stop and reduce the pollution of the Ganga river.
To improve the quality of the water of the Ganga river.
Biodiversity preservation that depends on the Ganga river.
Take up research and development for conservation of the Ganga river.
Development of new sewage treatment technologies such as Up-flow Anaerobic Sludge Blanket.
Reduce the pollution of the river by making use of soft-shelled turtles
To implement the same objectives to other rivers in India.

Role Of Outside Agencies In Ganga Action Plan

Not only India, but international agencies also played an important role in this plan. Some of the contributions made by them are:

Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) provided the technical support to conduct the development study and feasibility check for this plan.
This work continued from March 2003 to September 2005.
This study mainly focused on 4 cities that are Varanasi, Lucknow, Kanpur, and Allahabad.
JICA also signed a loan agreement with Government of India of 1640 crore rupees for the implementation of this plan in these 4 cities.
Out of total 1640 crores, Rs.540 crores was spent only on Varanasi.

Ganga Action Plan Achievements

Some achievements of Ganga Action Plan are as follows:

Quality of the Ganga water improved as compared to the water quality before 1985.
652 projects were completed out of the 764 projects till 2014.
Construction of 35 sewage treatment plants was planned in 5 states.
The waste in the Ganga river has reduced to a great extent and this plan also set up an example for the conservation and protection of rivers.

Reasons for Failure of Ganga Action Plan

Though Ganga Action Plan has been successful in some areas, it still failed to improve the situation to a great extent. Some of the reasons why Ganga Action Plan failed are:

Lack of funds made it difficult to setup adequate sewage treatment infrastructure of the required capacity.
Lack of community participation and awareness among the people was a major reason.
Failure to comply with the regulations and continued release of the harmful wastes into the rivers by industries was also a reason.
Lack of stringent controls and regulations was also a reason for its failure on the part of the government.
The area of the Ganga drainage basin made it very difficult to map all the pollution sources.
Lack of long term vision also led to the failure of Ganga Action Plan.

Frequently Asked Questions