Rivers & Water Bodies | Water supply, consumption and pollution in cities

Kochi caught between the Periyar, surging sea and tidal floods

The intense rainfall in July and August in Kochi this year alarmed those who had witnessed the deadly floods in 2018 when Periyar River submerged vast areas of the city. Nearby, the Chellanam-Cherai coastal stretch has seen huge sea surges…

Frequent flood hazards show the downside of urbanisation

The northern hill states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, and the north-eastern state of Assam have been reeling under massive floods this…

Apli Kham: Ecological river restoration as placemaking

The journey of Kham River Restoration Mission in Aurangabad may provide the path to placemaking in a complex situation. Through collaborations, imaginative…

Delhi’s real town planner, the Yamuna, still gasps for life

Over the decades, even as multi-crore programmes to clean the river are expanded, the Yamuna and its floodplain continue to be polluted.…

Make space for rivers in cities, draft policies to protect them

Natural rivers and their ecosystems in cities are being ruined in the name of development with projects stripping away them of their…

The Sabarmati story: A river is more than a usable resource

The redeveloped, concretised, and glitzy Sabarmati riverfront in Ahmedabad is a far cry from the meandering river which flows into the Arabian…

Pune’s Mula-Mutha sinks into ecological disaster

The ancient river, Mula-Mutha, has been battered by floods, encroachments, and rampant constructions causing massive environmental damage. Turned into a sewer and…

‘Why do we not see that our cities have come up around rivers?’

There is a severe stress on our rivers when we treat them like a resource which can be exploited instead of protecting them. Across cities in India, the story of rivers is similar -- heavily polluted with industrial and household…

Water in the city: A matter of ecology, public health, and livelihoods

The importance of wetlands and waterbodies in urban planning has come to the fore after the devastating floods in India’s Bengaluru. They…

‘We need to plan cities for extremes. Climate Change is all about extremes’

The torrential rain and floods in Bengaluru in early September grabbed international attention, showing up wide cracks in the basic infrastructure of…