Delhi’s tap water is unsafe for drinking?

Keeping the rising rate of water-borne illnesses and pollution in mind, the study was conducted as per directions of the Ministry of Consumer Affairs Food & PD to check the quality of piped drinking water being supplied in the country in keeping with the objectives of the Jal Jeevan Mission. For the same, the project has been divided into four phases. During the first phase of the quality check, samples of drinking water were drawn from 11 locations across Delhi and in the second phase samples were drawn from 20 other state capitals and sent for testing as per Indian Standards.

After the completion of the test, it was found that all the 11 samples drawn from Delhi did not comply with the requirements of the Indian Standard. It was reported that all the samples failed in several of the parameters. In Hyderabad, Bhubaneshwar, Ranchi, Raipur, Amravati, and Shimla, one or more samples did not comply with the requirements. Also, the samples of Jaipur, Dehradun, Bengaluru, Lucknow and Kolkata failed. Only 10 samples drawn from Mumbai was found to comply with the requirements of the Indian Standards.

In reaction to the report, Delhi's Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has asked Ram Vilas Paswan to accompany a Delhi Jal Board team that will in a few days collect water samples randomly from five places in every MCD ward and test for quality. In a statement Kejriwal has said, "The capital's water quality is better than European standards." The AAP government has also stated that Delhi Jal Board regularly collects samples for tests and all previous tests have revealed that city's water quality is comfortably within WHO norms.

In a statement, Ram Vilas Paswan has said that the third and fourth phase of the water testing plan will be completed by 15th August 2020.