The Attukal Pongala came as a mammoth challenge for the city Corporation which is in the middle of its pet project — ‘My City, Beautiful City’— which aims at making the city free from waste, with focus on waste treatment at source and segregation.
But just after the Pongala, as always, the roads across the city were strewn with plastic cups, bottles, leftover ash, burned wood, broken bricks, paper, leaves, and other materials.
For the 2,000-odd sanitation workers of the Corporation, the post-Pongala clean-up drive is a huge challenge. With the number of devotees increasing and the resultant spreading of the festival to newer locations with every passing year, the workers had a tough task at hands. But within a few hours of the Tantri sprinkling the holy water at the ‘pandara aduppu’ on Thursday afternoon, much of the garbage from the main areas of the city was removed by these workers.
The undamaged bricks were piled up at several points and later taken away by contractors in trucks. There were some who were seen carrying off a few bricks in bikes and autorickshaws. Despite prior directives from the Corporation to the voluntary organisations distributing food and water, and the devotees, to not bring in plastic plates and cups, it mostly went unheeded.
“There has been some small change, especially in the areas around the temple, where people have used less plastic compared to last time. But still there is a huge amount of plastic,” said S. Pushpalatha, Health Standing Committee chairperson of the Corporation.
The clean-up brigade armed with large trucks and small handcarts set out to work around 3 p.m.
In the initial stages, they concentrated on clearing the main thoroughfare stretching from Palayam to East Fort. One side of the road in front of the Secretariat was clean in less than an hour.
Since the usual dump yard for Pongala waste, Erumakkuzhy was sealed last year, the waste was taken to 5-6 other locations spread across the city, in Iranimuttom, Eenchakkal, Sasthamangalam, Peroorkada, and Medical College.
The Corporation authorities said that the main roads will be washed down after 10 p.m., once the removal of garbage is done.