New Delhi: The Central Ground Water Authority (CGWA) has told NGT that 12 cricket stadiums across the country, including Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium, were yet to submit compliance reports on corrective measures to reduce their dependence on groundwater for maintenance.It said that 10 stadiums, among them Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium, Eden Gardens in Kolkata, IS Bindra Stadium in Mohali, and the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai, have initiated corrective steps such as the construction of rainwater harvesting systems and wastewater treatment plants. NGT is hearing a plea filed in 2021 against the use of groundwater for the maintenance of cricket grounds without having the alternative of using STP-treated water and rainwater harvesting systems for storing and recharging groundwater. The plea raised the issue of cricket matches organised for commercial and entertainment purposes without any concern for water conservation. In Aug 2023, TOI reported that the ministry of jal shakti had disclosed that out of 26 stadiums inspected across the country, 24 had borewells or tubewells for extracting groundwater, and only four stadiums had groundwater NOC. The report also said that 22 stadiums were partially compliant on the installation of rainwater harvesting mechanisms, the use of treated water, and NOC for extracting groundwater. NGT issued notices to the 22 stadiums. In a Jan 20 report, CGWA said 10 stadiums shared compliance reports, while the remaining 12 were yet to share these despite NGT issuing orders in March, July and Oct last year. The stadiums that did not submit their replies are stadiums in Delhi, Rajkot, Raipur, Pune, Jaipur, Indore, Mumbai, Kanpur, Lucknow, Hyderabad, Dharamshala and Cuttack. It asked for appropriate directions to the 12 stadiums. It said that Eden Gardens had operationalised a 150 KLD STP, while Wankhede had rainwater harvesting pits operational since 2017 and installed three additional ring wells as pits.
