Cleanliness survey teams likely to visit Amritsar soon

Amritsar, April 1

The cleanliness survey 2022 has started and the survey team from the Ministry of Urban Development and Housing may visit the city to observe cleanliness soon. A few days ago, a team to recertify the open defecation free (ODF) status had visited the city.

Despite best efforts by the health wing of the MC, garbage heaps can be seen at various places in the city. With the help of solid waste management company, the MC collects door-to-door garbage, but still it can be seen piled up on various corners and roadside dumps. Even city dwellers complain that garbage is not being lifted from their houses regularly. Even workers of solid waste management company admit that due to poor infrastructure and machinery they are not able to visit the houses daily.

As a result, the city’s ranking has slip as compared to last year’s. The city was ranked 34th in the category of cities having a population of more than 10 lakh people. At present, the segregation of garbage on source level is major challenge for the MC. Around 35,000 households are segregating dry and wet waste in the city till date. The Municipal Corporation had started several projects to segregate dry and wet waste in the past.

Under this, people are being motivated to keep garbage in separate dustbins. Along with this, they are also being made aware to keep wet and dry waste separately. The MC had also distributed two dustbins in many areas for the cause. Recently, new vehicles and machines equipped with segregation setups were launched in the city for garbage collection.

At present, the garbage collection in 13 out of 85 wards is being conducted by the MC while in the other 72 wards the work of garbage collection is with a private solid waste management company, AVERDA.

“As far as private firm is concerned, we have imposed a penalty of Rs 19 lakh for their short coming during the last month. We keep a check on their functioning. This time the focus of the survey would be segregation of waste. We are making efforts to aware the public to segregate the garbage in their kitchens,” said Dr Yogesh Arora, Municipal Health Officer.