CAG Flags Rs 949 Cr HSPCB Sewage Gap

GURUGRAM: The Comptroller and Auditor General has found that the Haryana State Pollution Control Board failed to impose about Rs 949 crore in environmental compensation linked to untreated or poorly treated sewage, with Gurugram's master drains and treatment gaps singled out in Report No. 4 of 2026.

The Composite Audit Report (Civil) for the year ended March 2024 covers eight districts. It says HSPCB did not take cognisance of local bodies failing to treat 100 percent of generated sewage after National Green Tribunal directions of August 2019, leaving Rs 902.97 crore unimposed. Another Rs 46.30 crore was not imposed on 26 sewage treatment plants and two common effluent treatment plants that breached discharge norms for long stretches. Together the unacted amount is Rs 949.27 crore.

Gurugram numbers in the audit

As of March 2024, areas under the Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority generated 550 million litres a day of domestic sewage. After accounting for 90 MLD treated and reused by colonisers, GMDA needed to treat 460 MLD but had installed capacity of 415 MLD across 12 plants. Average daily sewage received was only 397 MLD, leaving a 63 MLD gap, or 14 percent, apparently released without treatment.

Only 12 of 16 STPs in Gurugram district were meeting discharge norms at the time of audit. Legs I, II and III showed average biochemical oxygen demand of 88, 97 and 106 mg per litre against a 10 mg per litre norm, and faecal coliform counts from 1,816 to 3,310 MPN per 100 ml against a norm of 100.

The report cites a two-year delay in completing a 25 MLD plant at Manesar (finished October 2025 against an October 2023 schedule) and a Jahajgarh 20 MLD plant that was receiving only about 5 MLD because connecting sewers remained incomplete, leaving about Rs 18.67 crore of expenditure largely idle. On micro-STPs in city parks, auditors found that one contractor, Earth Water Limited, had completed only nine of 21 plants, with Rs 20.84 crore already paid and further action delayed for years.

Separately, of Rs 264.76 crore in environmental compensation HSPCB imposed on commercial and industrial units in the eight districts between 2019 and 2024, only Rs 50.50 crore was recovered, leaving Rs 214.26 crore pending. Gurugram North had 92.52 percent of its imposed amount unrecovered. The recovered Rs 50.50 crore also remained unutilised for restoration work as of March 2024.

GMDA told auditors in July 2025 that it had prepared a drain action plan and aimed to raise treatment capacity to 977 MLD by December 2028. HSPCB said it was working on recovery shortfalls. The CAG findings are audit observations based on records up to the periods examined; they are not court convictions. For Gurugram, they add documentary weight to long-running complaints about sewage in stormwater drains feeding the Yamuna.