Mumbai, tell BMC within a week how you will segregate, process waste

Civic body will not collect wet waste after the new deadline if large housing societies, hotels and hospitals still don’t respond with their proposals

Nearly 3,140 bulk waste generators, including hotels, hospitals and large housing societies, have got a week’s extension to submit their garbage segregation and processing plan to the civic body. If they fail to respond by October 10, the BMC will stop collecting waste from them.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) extended the deadline on Tuesday, after only 251 bulk generator – those producing more than 10kg waste daily – met the civic body’s October 2 deadline to start segregating garbage and composting wet waste. (HT photo)

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) extended the deadline on Tuesday, after only 251 bulk generator – those producing more than 10kg waste daily – met the civic body’s October 2 deadline to start segregating garbage and composting wet waste. Rough estimates show the waste reaching city’s dumping grounds has reduced by 200 tonnes every day since October 2.

The new deadline allows 3,140 bulk generators to respond to BMC with their waste plans. The civic body will go through their plans and give further extensions as long as a clear road map for waste management is evident. “We will reach out to bulk generators through our help desk officials to understand if there are any practical and technical problems and offer our assistance. If they still fail to comply, BMC will not pick up wet waste after October 10,” said Kiran Dighavkar, nodal officer, Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.

Following opposition, the civic body also announced relaxing the deadline and had asked for housing societies to submit a plan to get the extension. However, only 188 bulk generators across 18 wards came forward to ask for the extension, while 3,140 units did not respond to civic body’s deadline.

In the first week of September, the BMC also staged a citywide exhibition, displaying the composting machines of 40 to 50 firms before 22,000 bulk generators. It was attended by chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and actor Amitabh Bachchan.

Every day, around 7,800 metric tonnes of garbage is generated in the city, of which around 3,000 metric tonnes is treated scientifically at the Kanjurmarg dumping ground. With the new order, the BMC hopes to reduce the burden on the three dumping grounds, which are saturated. If the new order is successfully implemented, civic body has claimed that the untreated waste going to the dumping site will be reduced by nearly 1,800 metric tonnes per day.