City residents peeved as MC vans not picking up garbage

Sameer Singh

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, May 22

Residents from different areas in the city have said that the Municipal Corporation-run garbage collection mini pick-up vans have not been picking up garbage from their houses for a long time. As a result, either garbage keeps on piling outside their residences or residents have to carry it on their own to isolated places to dump it.

However, garbage-collection staff of the MCB says that due to narrow streets, their vehicles cannot enter some areas in the city with the result that they have to wait outside these streets to collect garbage.

A staff member from the garbage-collection team of MCB requesting anonymity said while a few residents in these areas brought garbage to the vehicles, others do not turn up, expecting us to visit their houses to collect garbage which is not possible.

A majority of residents from near the old city area and areas adjacent to Qila Mubarak have raised concern that the garbage-collection vans have not been picking up garbage from their houses. Besides, residents of Sirki Bazaar, Afeem Wali Gali, Kikkar Das Mohalla, Parasram Nagar, Partap Nagar, Ganesh Nagar, Guru Nanak Pura and interior streets of Amrik Singh Road are some of the affected areas.

Gurtej Singh, a resident of Parasram Nagar, said, “The garbage-collection van in our area comes in the afternoon and remains stationed around 300 metres away from my house, but we never come to know about it. People who hear the whistle sound take their garbage to the place where the van is parked. If the MCB has spent money to provide this facility to city residents, they should have worked out a proper provision so that every resident can avail the facility.”

A senior official of the MCB requesting anonymity said that during the planning stage, a rosy picture was projected regarding the garbage pick-up van project, but when implemented at the ground level, it seemed to have failed in its purpose. Residents of many areas in the city had been hit hard.

He said if the problem continued for a few more weeks, residents would start dumping garbage by the roadside leading to the same problem which we had been countering for long.

He suggested that the MCB must continue with the garbage-collection pick-up van to collect garbage from where it could reach easily and re-introduce the traditional method of garbage collection via rickshaws from areas where these vans could reach.

Mayor Balwant Rai Nath said, “We are planning to increase the number of such vans and where these vans cannot reach, rehris will start picking garbage from houses again.”

It is pertinent to mention that there are 50 wards in the city and the MCB had introduced 46 door-to-door garbage-collection vehicles at an estimated cost of Rs 2.38 crore last month.