Authority partial with villages, denying door-to-door garbage collection: Environment Activist Vikrant Tongad
Ashish Kedia
(02/05/2017) Greater Noida : Greater Noida development authority has lately acquired land of around 100 villages of nearby areas for development purpose. A lot of these villages are taking shape of small towns and the population is also increasing keeping in synchronization with various demand-supply ratios. However this has also increased the garbage in these villages and authority is still unable to do the needful.
Urbanization of Villages:
Speaking with TEN NEWS, environmental activist Vikrant Tongad said, “There are no affordable housing schemes in Greater Noida city for labour class. Henceforth a lot of these immigrants from nearby districts take shelter in neighbouring villages. This has also increased the garbage production in these villages”.
No Effective Mechanism for Garbage Collection:
Environmental activist Vikrant Tongad also informed that according to Municipal Solid Waste Rules 2016, it is mandatory to do door-to-door collection of garbage from every house. This rule doesn’t differentiates between villages, town or metropolitan cities and is equally applicable everywhere.
However Greater Noida authority is completely ignoring these guidelines. There is no effective mechanism for collecting waste garbage from around 100 villages. Reportedly sanitation workers only visit villages once every week and just collect garbage from one or two major dumping sites of the village.
Unsatisfactory Reply in RTI
Vikrant Tongad had filed an RTI with Greater Noida authority to seek details of existing mechanism of garbage collection in different villages of Greater Noida.
In reply to his RTI Authority has replied that tenders have been floated on 17th March 2017 for garbage collection from villages. Sanitation workers have also been deployed in the villages for the same purpose. However Authority has said that it is not opting for door-to-door garbage collection in Villages and this facility will be limited to only sectors of the city.
However Vikrant has also alleged that reply from authority officials is unsatisfactory and there are many anomalies with the current reply.
