E-Paper
PCMC needs to ensure people participation: Residents
Navi Mumbai
Navi Mumbai
Even as Panvel City Municipal Corporation (PCMC) claims to be taking efforts to improve Swachh Swachh Sarvekshan rank this year, residents said that apart from putting up posters and banners not much is being done.
The civic body plans to install one lakh posters and banners to ensure people’s participation in the Swachh survey.
Panvel ranked 87 in cleanliness survey in 2018.
Additional commissioner PCMC Prashant Rasal said, “We are ensuring that garbage is collected and not piled on roads. We are planning to spread the cleanliness message among residents through posters and banners.”
Although the civic body said they are doing all they can, officials cited lack of manpower and monitoring of the work.
A civic official requesting anonymity said, “We don’t have enough manpower to monitor the work under Swacchta Abhiyan. There has been no aggressive campaigning and not a single housing society has taken up waste segregation drive in the past six to eight months.”
Panvel, Kharghar, Kalamboli, Kamothe, Roadpali and Karanjade come under PCMC.
Chhaya Taralekar, 54, an environmentalist who has been working towards effective waste segregation, said, “The civic body lacks in many aspects. There is no awareness on benefits of segregation and compost-making in housing societies.”
“PCMC has announced 5% rebate in property tax for those societies which have been segregating waste but not many know about this. Plastic menace is not being taken seriously and despite the ban, plastic is readily available,” said Taralekar.
There are more than 40 housing societies which are practising dry and wet waste segregation, including some at Kamothe and Roadpali. But, Panvel and Kalamboli residents have not taken up waste segregation.
A total of 470 tonnes of garbage is collected from PCMC nodes every day. Waste generated in PCMC node ends up in landfills and PCMC has not done anything about e-waste.
“Earlier, NGOs used to visit housing societies and organise workshops for waste segregation and proper disposal but there is not such activity now. If civic body does not involve us, how can it expect us to participate in the survey,” said Subham Nagpal, 32, a Kamothe resident.
Many individuals are taking green measures on their own.
