Civic body on its toes to improve city’s report card

JALANDHAR: Waste management has always been a tiring task for the Municipal Corporation (MC) and implementation of the ‘Door-to-door Collection and Segregation of Garbage and Enforcement of the Plastic Waste Management Rules 2016’ further plays a major obstacle in maintaining cleanliness in the city.

National Green Tribunal (NGT) has time and again stressed on the segregation of waste generated’

Ajay Joshi

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, April 8

Waste management has always been a tiring task for the Municipal Corporation (MC) and implementation of the ‘Door-to-door Collection and Segregation of Garbage and Enforcement of the Plastic Waste Management Rules 2016’ further plays a major obstacle in maintaining cleanliness in the city. National Green Tribunal (NGT) has also time and again stressed on the segregation of waste generated’ in the city.

After the city scored below average marks in various categories under the recently held ‘National Cleanliness Survey’, the MC authorities are on their toes to improve the city’s report card in the next survey.

MC Joint Commissioner Ashika Jain claimed that segregation of waste units would be completed in the city by December this year. Notably, city scored minimum marks in this particular category.

It was over two years ago that the MC launched the waste segregation project, but it has failed to implement it and not even 30 per cent of the wards have been covered under the project so far.

The project kicked off on April 23, 2017, from the Model Town area here and only a few colonies have been practising waste segregation.

Segregation of waste refers to categorisation of waste into two categories — biodegradable (vegetables, fruits, flowers, etc.) and non-biodegradable (plastics, paper, glass, metal, disposable clothes, etc).

Besides, waste management or segregation of waste is important as the city dump in Wariana village is now overflowing with the large amount of garbage being dumped there on a daily basis. The dump has now spread across over 15 acres.

The Joint Commissioner, who is heading the project in the city, said: “The civic body is committed towards implementing the project and had already roped in various colleges and mohalla karamcharis to spread awareness about segregation of waste and home composting.”

She said composting units had already been installed at Vijay Nagar, Adarsh Nagar Colony, Nangal Shama and residential areas of Choti Baradari road. In addition, she said, ‘Safai Karamchaari Finance Cooperation’, under the Ministry of Urban Development, has been asked to provide training to ragpickers on the management of the segregated waste.

Challenges before implementation of segregation project

There are an inadequate number of ragpickers as only 600 ragpickers are available for 2.33 lakh households.

Most of the ragpickers don’t even know the meaning of segregation of waste. While talking to The Tribune, some of them even claimed that they have not even been apprised of the same by the local civic body.

There is a shortage of garbage-lifting vehicles as well as bins. Rehris for ragpickers should be compartmentalised.