Despite its commitment made to the National Green Tribunal (NGT) in March this year, the Chandigarh municipal corporation has failed to meet the deadline to implement waste segregation throughout the city by September 30.
Now, it has sought time till October 15.
Additional municipal commissioner SK Jain said in the latest action-taken report submitted to the NGT, the MC has pleaded for a two-week extension to the deadline. “We have successfully begun segregation of waste in villages. We are hopeful to make it happen in other places as early as possible,” he said.
Sources said UT adviser Manoj Parida held a review meeting on Monday and asked MC officials
to speed up the process to collect segregated waste from households.
The MC so far has done little to ensure waste segregation in the city.
Last week, Jaypee Group that runs the garbage processing plant in Dadumajra moved the NGT, complaining that the civic body has not yet begun supplying segregated waste to it. Based on this plea, the NGT has sought a fresh report on this issue from an independent monitoring committee.
In case the MC fails to roll out the project despite extension, it may not only face heavy penalty from the green tribunal but the chances of Chandigarh to improve its ranking in the 2020 Swachh Survekshan will almost be ruled out.
Earlier this year, the city slipped to 20th rank, majorly due to its inability to implement waste segregation.
Vinod Vashisht, convener of the City Forum of Residents Welfare Organisations (CFORWO), said the MC’s claims of successfully launching waste segregation are hollow as there is no community engagement so far. “Cities like Indore and Bhopal have launched it successfully because of their connect with the masses,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Vinod Vashisht, convener of the City Forum of Residents Welfare Organisations (CFORWO), said the MC’s claims of successfully launching waste segregation are hollow as there is no community engagement so far. “Cities like Indore and Bhopal have launched it successfully because of their connect with the masses,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Baljinder Singh Bhittu, chairman of the Federation Of Sector Welfare Associations of Chandigarh (FOSWAC), said: “How will residents be motivated to segregate waste when there is still no change in the working of private waste collectors, despite numerous discussions? Even the MC has failed to set up the required infrastructure and has been seeking extensions from the NGT.”
Most of the two lakh households in urban areas of Chandigarh give their waste to door-to-door garbage collectors, who number around 1,500. However, garbage is collected in carts with no provision to segregate dry and wet waste.
The MC General House in December last year had passed a resolution that private collectors will buy e-carts by March 31 to keep the waste segregated while ferrying it to the collection points. However, the MC has now allowed them to make adjustments in their existing carts.
The MC was to also sign an agreement with them to streamline and monitor their working. However, the pact has not been signed yet.
In fact, the civic body had proposed a complete solid waste management chain. Waste collected from houses and shops in a segregated manner was to reach the Dadumajra processing plant through three major collection points. Later, dry waste was to be further segregated into recyclable and non-recyclable waste. However, work on the collection centres and recovery facility is yet to take off.
In view of the absence of waste segregation, working of the plant has also failed to improve. Recently, one of its walls collapsed due to excess waste collected there.