BMC falls behind desilting target ahead of Mumbai monsoon season

With less than three weeks to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) deadline for completing the desilting of Mumbai’s nullahs, the civic body is lagging behind by 26 per cent of its target for May 8. While the civic body had targeted the removal of 6,23,052 metric tonnes (MT) of silt from nullahs by Friday, it has managed to remove only 4,59,432 MT of silt.

Desilting work being carried out in Mithi River last year. FILE PIC/X/@mybmc

Earlier this week, Mumbai Mayor Ritu Tawde had directed the BMC officials to complete desilting of all the nullahs by May 31. BMC has targeted to remove 8,30,736 metric tonnes of silt by May 31. However, it has only achieved 56.96 per cent of the target by removing 4,73,219.09 metric tonnes.

At only 39.37 per cent, the civic body has finished the least amount of work in the eastern suburbs, while it has finished 61 per cent and 62 per cent of work in the Island City and the western suburbs, respectively.

Desilting Mithi River

The progress on removing silt from the 18-km-long Mithi River is the slowest, where the BMC has only managed to remove only 50,035 MT (37.83 per cent) of silt against the target of 1,32,265 MT.

No work has been done on the two portions of the Mithi River in the G North ward — at the Mahim Causeway and from Dharavi to Sion. Similarly, no silt has been removed from the river at the BKC connector and at Vakola Bridge in H East ward.

Official Speak

A civic official associated with the project said, “Tenders for the desilting work were delayed this year, and work started late. However, the administration has been instructed by the municipal commissioner in the monsoon-preparedness review meeting held last month to speed up the process and finish it in time for monsoons. Since monsoons arrived early last year [May 25, 2025], work is taking place on a war footing.”