Open house: Will study tour to Goa prove helpful in setting up new waste plant in Chandigarh?

The municipal corporation has decided to take councillors and residents of Dadu Majra to Goa to study the waste processing plant. It is a welcome move. The tour will help them know the intricacies of the working of the waste processing plant there. It will be better if some technical team also accompany them.

Advertisement

NPS Sohal, Chandigarh

QUESTION

A woman had a narrow escape when her car was washed away in gushing Ghaggar waters. With the onset of monsoon, what steps should Panchkula and Mohali administrations take to prevent such incidents?

Suggestions in not more than 70 words can be sent to openhouse@tribunemail.com

Study tour will be of no use

The tour will ultimately put financial burden on residents of Chandigarh as such exercises undertaken in the past produced no fruitful result. Instead, a team of engineers should be sent to Goa to see the functioning of the plant there. The team can take responsibility of the plant set up in the city in future. On the other hand, councillors may or may not be re-elected after their term gets over. Further, taking Dadu Majra residents along sounds irrational. This is all wastage of public funds.

Kirpal Singh

Seemingly more of a leisure trip

How can an entire team of councillors be required to study a system. Moreover, are they competent enough to understand the working of a waste processing plant? Don’t we have a team of technically qualified persons? This surely is a recreational tour.

Sapna Sharda, Chandigarh

Sheer waste of public funds

It is going to be a sightseeing tour for the councillors, who fight with each other, but put up a united front when it came to free tours. Councillors have no role to play in installing a new waste processing plant at Dadu Majra. Since every information is available online in text as well as video forms, there is no need to waste public money on such tours.

Capt Amar Jeet (retd), Kharar

All related information available on Internet

In the times of internet, knowledge is readily available. So-called study tour will be complete wastage of time and public money. If at all technical study is required to be undertaken, then a group of technocrats can be sent, not councillors.

Rakesh Chopra, Chandigarh

Send team of technocrats instead

Sending councillors and Dadu Majra residents on a study tour will be of no use. Engineers and other infrastructure specialists should be sent instead for better understanding. Previous visits of councillors hardly served any purpose.

Wg Cdr JS Minhas (retd), Mohali

Councillors not expert or competent

Chandigarh councillors have a chequered history of occasionally going on such study tours. One really wonders whether they all happen to be subject experts or competent enough to make some realistic assessment of the working of a waste processing plant in Goa? Hats off to AAP councillors who reportedly refused to be a part of the tour while stating that it would amount to mere wastage of tax payers’ money. The MC should elaborate and put in public domain the real achievements of the previous study tours.

Kumar Gupt, Panchkula

Taking residents along a good move

Residents living in the vicinity of the Dadu Majra plant have been complaining of skin diseases along with foul smell. So a tour to study the working of a waste processing plant at Goa and establishing one in Chandigarh is a welcoming step. Taking the residents along is a much better idea as it promotes transparency and will help them to know the working of the plant as they are the ones bearing the major brunt.

Jasleen Kaur, Chandigarh

Positive step to make city cleaner

A tour to Goa by councillors as well as area residents is a welcome and positive step towards getting a first-hand account of the functioning of a waste management plant. The initiative will definitely prove helpful in making the city beautiful, clean and green. A time frame may also be fixed for setting up a waste processing plant.

Col TBS Bedi, Mohali

Understand value of public money

There is no need to waste time and public money on a baseless study tour. MC councillors have no right to spend public money on a tour to Goa for their enjoyment. They should understand the value of public money and it should be utilised properly.

Sumesh Kumar Badhwar, Mohali

Learn lessons from futile Panchkula MC tour

A similar tour was taken up by Panchkula MC about five years ago to study garbage processing plants at Indore and Nashik but it proved useless. Panchkula residents are still struggling to get out of stinking surroundings in the trans-Ghaggar area. Are councillors technologically competent to learn the nitty-gritties of a waste processing plant? Sending a team of technical staff, who are going to be entrusted with the job of installation of a plant in the UT, may prove fruitful.

RP Malhotra, Panchkula

Make councillors pay cost of trip

The Goa tour is not the first to be undertaken by Chandigarh councillors. Earlier, they had been to foreign and domestic tours, but of no use. Those trips only drained MC coffers. If councillors are so much interested in studying the working of the Goa plant, they should spend pay for the trip from their own pockets. It will be better if the MC took help of techies from the IIT-Ropar to set up a waste processing plant in Chandigarh.

MR Bhateja, Nayagaon

UT Administrator must intervene

Public representatives in the MC House enjoy lavish trips on taxpayers’ money, which should have been utilised for the betterment, development and upkeep of the city. The UT Administrator must take a note of this splurging of public money under the garb of learning and educational outings. The productivity and outcome of tours must be sought from the councillors. The public representatives are accountable to the citizens. They must provide complete outcome of such trips, which they enjoy with their families at far-off places.

Karan Singh Vinayak, Chandigarh

Taxpayers’ money to go down the drain

The Goa tour by councillors and residents of Dadu Majra will be just wastage of funds. The taxpayers’ money is set to go down the drain. One can learn about the working of a waste processing plant online. Years have passed, but the MC and the Administration have failed to set up a new plant in the city. Too much interference by the bureaucrats and ruckus created in MC meetings have kept major projects of the city in a limbo.

Abhilasha Gupta, Mohali

Show them videos of different plants

The MC spends huge amount on such tours every year, but these trips never brought positive results. Are these councillors engineers or subject experts? It will be better if videos of different waste processing plants are shown to all councillors, residents of the area where the new plant will be set up, MC engineers and subject experts. After studying their functioning, the one that suits the city needs should be finalised.

Sukhwant Bhullar, Chandigarh

Several other issues Plaguing city

If MC councillors are really sincere towards residents, they should sit together and brainstorm the issues being faced by people, including parking, stray dog/cattle menace, cycle tracks and 24X7 electricity and water supply. Unnecessary tours and visits will be an unwarranted burden on the exchequer. Such junkets undertaken in the garb of study tour are a misuse of public money. Why don’t councillors present utilisation report after each study tour? Why don’t they tell people what had transpired during their visit? One fails to understand why they take their family members along.

Sanjay Chopra, Mohali

Tour can help them reach consensus

It is quite important to note that the conditions and requirements in Goa might be different from those in Chandigarh. The tour could serve as a platform for discussions, exchange of ideas and building consensus among stakeholders. Ultimately, the plant would depend on multiple factors, including the information gathered during the tour, the commitment of stakeholders and availability of resources.

Anita K Tandon, Mundi Kharar

Team duty-bound to show results

It is good idea to send councillors and Dadu Majra residents on a study tour to Goa. It will help in identifying sustainable, tried and trusted practices at the plant there before commissioning a new waste processing unit in Chandigarh. However, such study tours have remained under a cloud in the past with questions being raised over their utility and productivity. Hence, it becomes the duty of the MC team towards citizens to justify this study tour with visible, result-oriented efforts and output.

Vijay Shukla, Chandigarh

Better Get virtual presentation

In today’s era of technology, one can access desired information from the remotest corner of the globe, besides live/virtual presentations on a project by the client. In such a scenario, sending a delegation of councillors at public expense to Goa for studying a garbage treatment plant is highly deplorable. The MC authorities must learn a lesson from the history wherein hardly any guidance worth implementing was received from such excursions.

SS Arora, Mohali

Reconsider members of delegation

Inclusion of members of different political parties and residents of Dadu Majra in a study tour team to Goa is sheer wastage of public money. Such a team can hardly understand the intricacies of a waste processing project and unable to provide useful inputs. Instead, the touring team should include experts in the field and the councillor who represents people living in the area where a plant is going to be set up. On return, the team may demonstrate the project to the officials concerned and the stakeholders.

RPS Chopra, Chandigarh

Don’t waste time, set up new plant fast

Such visits entail lots of funds, and the MC is already broke. Have we gained anything from tours undertaken in the past? Their reports were never made public. Anybody going to study a project is required to submit a report. The MC should not waste time any further and start process to set up an advanced garbage processing plant.

Bharat Bhushan Sharma

Don’t splurge on futile tours

The study tours by MC Councillors have failed to benefit the city residents in any way and proved to be sheer wastage of public money. All wards in the city are facing issues of sanitation, garbage disposal, water supply, power supply, maintenance of parks, parking facilities, stray dog menace and many more. The MC should work towards the completion of pending projects, uplifting amenities and addressing public grievances on a priority, rather than wasting money on such tours.

Shruti K Chawla, Chandigarh

Will help find solution to garbage issue

Study of anything adds to one’s knowledge. Either one learns a new thing or reduces the number of mistakes. Studying a waste material plant in Goa is a good step. It will certainly help in finding a solution to get rid of waste generated in the city. The team going on the tour should instead comprise of people who have some technical knowledge and are serious about the purpose of the trip.

Avinash Goyal, Chandigarh

Trip will not make any value addition to plan

The Goa tour seems to be an eyewash and would not add any value to the proposed installation of a waste processing plant at Dadu Majra. Rather than wasting taxpayers’ money, the MC should have utilised all resources available at its disposal for setting up the plant. The money spent on the tour could have been utilised to improve the infrastructure in the city.

Nitin Kalra, Chandigarh

Will put financial burden on broke MC

The tour to Goa for understanding the waste processing practice will put avoidable financial burden on the cash-strapped civic body. It will be just a leisure trip for councillors. The money could be used to call experts from other states to suggest ways to set up a state-of-the-art processing plant in Chandigarh.

Anil Kumar Yadav, Chandigarh

Administrator junked Goa trip last year

In the past about 10 years, the MC has already spent more than Rs 1 crore on such unworthy tours. In many cases, even reports on the so-called benefits to be accrued have not been submitted by members of the visiting team. Last year, the UT Administrator had rejected the proposed tour to Goa. What is new in it now? The issue relating to study tours by councillors had invited flak of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, which called these trips as “unfruitful expenditure”. Besides, several officers, who had earlier undertaken such fruitless tours, have been transferred.

SK Khosla, Chandigarh

Misuse of taxpayers’ hard-earned money

Councillors’ trip to Goa to study the waste management plant is an unwanted and uncalled for proposal. It is a complete misuse of the hard-earned money of the taxpayers. It is certain that the trip will be nothing more than a vacation for the councillors.

Saikrit Gulati, Chandigarh

Send professionals to study project

One fails to understand what purpose will a tour by councillors and residents of Dadu Majra to the waste management plant in Goa serve? If at all a study had to be carried out, it should have been done by some professionals who could understand the system. Spending lakhs on the trip to just watch the project is no wise move. Waste management at Goa is done by an establishment based in Delhi. At the most, the MC could have contacted the Delhi firm for better guidance. Already financially-starved corporation should not be overburdened.

Sqn Ldr Manjit Singh Johar (retd), Chandigarh