Garbage piles up outside Ggm societies as sanitation staff strike enters week 4

Many roads in residential neighbourhoods are littered with garbage, with residents of sectors across the city highlighting the issue by sharing photographs

Piles of garbage have appeared outside residential societies in Gurugram because sanitation workers of the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) and private agencies, who collect waste from the roads and secondary collection points, have been on strike for the past three weeks due to non-payment of salary, residents and civic officials said on Thursday.

Garbage on the Khandsa Road near SD High School in Gurugram on Thursday. (Parveen Kumar.HT Photo)

Many roads in residential neighbourhoods are littered with garbage, with residents of sectors across the city highlighting the issue by sharing photographs on social media websites and with civic officials.

“We have stopped going out for morning and evening walks because there are mounds of garbage on vacant land in our sector, at our society’s entry and exit gates, and especially in parks. Sanitation workers have not come for the past 21 days, and we raised the matter with MCG’s joint commissioner last week, but to no avail,” said Puneet Pahwa, general secretary of the Sector 45 residents’ welfate association (RWA).

According to officials, 3,400 employees and contractual workers of the MCG are on strike and have stopped cleaning streets in residential areas and public places. The sanitation workers are protesting against MCG issuing new tenders to hire fresh agencies for outsourcing the sanitation work. The workers’ union has demanded the cancellation of tenders and urged the civic body to employ the sanitation staff already hired by existing agencies.

The union leaders said they will not let the new agencies start work unless their demands are met. The door-to-door garbage collection is done by the solid waste management concessionaire Ecogreen. However, Ecogreen does not have a mandate to operate in all residential societies; those not covered by it have seen no garbage collection in three weeks, said officials aware of the matter.

Naresh Malkat, the Nagar Palika Karamchari Sangh’s state secretary said, “Around 3,400 sanitation workers have been affected. They are jobless now, and new workers from West Bengal have been hired through new contractors. Each time, the government has given us false promises and betrayed us. Last time, we had called off the strike after the government gave assurances,” he said, adding that they will not allow new workers to work in the city unless their demands are met.

An employee of one of the new agencies hired by MCG, who asked not to be named, said they were not being allowed to work by the sanitation workers’ union.

“In the last three weeks, our sector has become a breeding ground for mosquitoes and dengue cases have increased. Our children have to wait for their buses near garbage piles. Our area supervisor told us that they don’t have the manpower and cannot clean the area daily. The situation is worsening daily,” said Neeru Yadav, an RWA member of Sector 23A.

Abhay Poona, vice-president of Gurgaon Citizen’s Council (GCC), said MCG previously threatened to deduct money from the contractors as they were unable to keep the city clean, but even the new agencies that they hired have been unable to collect garbage regularly.

Vijay Shiv Nath, president of the Malibu Towne RWA Floors, said they had called MCG officials numerous times, but they don’t pick up calls. “We have told MCG in writing that we will hire a private vendor to collect garbage since the contractors have failed, but we have not received any response. We need MCG’s help to remove the garbage dump from our neighbourhood,” he said.

“Workers from the old agencies are not letting the new workers sweep or pick up waste from residential areas. MCG has failed to understand the gravity of the issue leading to health issues,” said Ajay Sharma, member of the Tulip Ivory RWA in Sector 70.

MCG officials said they are trying to resolve the issue and are holding meetings with union leaders and the agencies. “We have decided to impose a penalty on the new agencies and also deduct 50% of their payment based on the areas found unclean. We served them notices on Thursday and informed them that if an MCG team finds garbage piles in residential or commercial areas, we will not pay them for that area,” said MCG joint commissioner Naresh Kumar, adding that it would take another week to resolve the sanitation issue in the city.