MC wants Fortis booked

Rajinder Nagarkoti

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 24

The Chandigarh Municipal Corporation today wrote to the UT police for registration of an FIR against erring officials of Fortis Hospital, Mohali, and contractors who dumped hazardous bio-medical waste at the dumping ground in Dadu Majra.

Yesterday, area residents had found used syringes, surgical gloves and other bio -medical waste along with documents of Fortis Hospital, Mohali, dumped at the dumping ground in Dadu Majra.

Confirming the development, Medical Officer Health (MOH), Dr PS Bhatti of the Municipal Corporation, said they had written to the UT police to take action against the erring officials of Fortis Hospital, and the truck driver who dumped the hazardous bio -medical waste at the dumping ground. The dumping ground is only for the horticulture or treated waste but not for hazardous bio-medical waste, he said.

Meanwhile, this morning, a team of the municipal corporation visited the site and clicked photographs of the bio-medical waste at the site.

Local resident Narinder Chaudhary, who is also the president of the Dalit Raksha Dal, Chandigarh, said though the MC staff visited the site and clicked photographs, but they did not remove the bio-medical waste from the site. Today, they have written to the UT Administrator and the UT police to initiate action against the hospital, contractor and the MC officials, whosoever is involved in the incident, he said.

On the other side, the Fortis spokesperson said, “Fortis lives up to its responsibility of safeguarding human health. Fortis Hospital, Mohali, strictly follows the norms set by the Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB), which has mandated that the waste has to move out of premises within 48 hours. Fortis has a PPCB-approved arrangement with Rainbow Environments who take the waste to Balyali, near Kharar. Their enclosed vehicle comes daily and a bar-coded sticker is put on each and every sealed bag. Through GPS, Fortis is on real time with the PPCB website and the status of waste can be checked on the same. This has been done to track the vehicle and catch pilferage. We have written to the PPCB to investigate into the matter since our system is foolproof.”

Residents of Dadu Majra village and colony said dumping of hazardous bio-medical waste at the dumping site, which is very close to their houses, poses a threat to them. They said they were already suffering from various ailments due to the dumping ground being close to their houses, they said.

2,039 kgs of waste is collected from hospitals

According to information, a total of 2,039 kgs of waste is collected from hospitals, nursing homes, clinics, laboratories and civil dispensaries across the city on a daily basis. The entire city, however, has only one service provider, for collecting the waste from all the 30 private labs, nursing homes, hospitals and clinics besides 54 dispensaries and three main government hospitals — the PGI, the GMSH-16 and the GMCH-32, in Chandigarh.