Skip cleaning and burn garbage, even if it spoils the city’s air.

Due to the cleaning being done in homes during the festival of Diwali, the amount of garbage has now more than doubled. Four days ago the quantity of waste has crossed 1300 tonnes. Although the amount of garbage has reduced, it is still not being collected completely. Now an average of 750 tonnes of garbage is being generated in the city. Garbage bins are still visible in the city despite collection vehicles making more trips than the monthly average.

In places where garbage is not being collected, sanitation workers are setting it on fire. Due to this, the air quality index (AQI) of the city is also in danger of deteriorating. There was a sudden increase in the amount of garbage due to cleaning in homes, markets and commercial establishments on Diwali. On October 24, 1304 tonnes of garbage was transported to the landfill sites at Kedarpur and Bara.

Now the cleaning work in the houses has almost ended, hence the amount of garbage has reduced, but its collection is again becoming irregular. Municipal Corporation Commissioner Aman Vaishnav had directed that all the garbage collection vehicles of the corporation should make maximum rounds of garbage transfer stations. In such a situation, the number of trips of garbage vehicles reached above 900, but now with the amount of garbage decreasing, the field staff has again started being negligent.

The result of this is that instead of collecting garbage from the bins, the field staff is now setting them on fire. On Monday, a garbage bin was set on fire near Veerangana Jhalkari Bai College in ward number eight of Gwalior Assembly. Similarly, in ward number nine, near Raja Mandi bridge, instead of collecting garbage, it was set on fire.

233 tippers deployed for garbage collection

• The Municipal Corporation has currently deployed 233 tippers and 97 secondary waste vehicles for garbage collection. In this, 83 tippers and 32 secondary vehicles are being operated in Gwalior assembly constituency, 86 tipper and 36 secondary vehicles in East assembly constituency, 64 tipper and 29 secondary waste vehicles are being operated in South assembly constituency. Although corporation officials claim that the garbage collection system has already improved, the problem still persists due to lack of public cooperation. People are still throwing garbage in the open instead of tipper vehicles, while sweepers are also burning the garbage.
• Problem will arise after Diwali: Garbage collection will be done in the morning on the day of Diwali, but the sanitation workers remain on leave for the next two days. In such a situation, garbage is not collected from the city for two days. As soon as Duj ends, the Municipal Corporation staff will again face a challenge, because more than 800 tonnes of garbage will once again be seen on the city roads. In such a situation, once again we will have to face a challenge in collecting this waste.