The Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has been directed to take steps to ensure that its pourakarmikas or persons employed by private contractors go door-to-door to collect garbage daily.
The Karnataka High Court, on Thursday, made it clear that it would be the BBMP’s duty to organise door-to-door collection of garbage at a ‘pre-informed time’ from residential and non-residential premises, including slums.
A Division Bench comprising Justice N. Kumar and Justice B.V. Nagarathna, which has been monitoring the BBMP’s actions, including setting up of waste processing plants instead of dumping at landfills, has issued directions to make segregation mandatory after ensuring that a minimum number of waste processing plants have been set up.
The Bench had earlier directed the BBMP to stop dumping of waste at landfills in a phased manner to prevent Mavallipura and Mandur-like situations. On Thursday, it directed the civic body to ensure that henceforth wastes should not only be collected in segregated form but also transported and processed in the same form.
Transportation The court said that waste should not be visible to people when it is being transported to the processing units. Also, it should be covered property to ensure that it does not fall out of vehicles during transportation.
The civic body is also to ensure that its pourakarmikas or the workers employed by its contractors do not mix segregated waste. Secondly, garbage should not be left on the roadside. The court made it clear that secondary segregation points could be set up only as an exception when waste is received in non-segregated form.
The Bench also said that effective management of MSW is the need of the hour as across the globe the process is becoming sophisticated and waste is now being treated as a type of resource.
HC directions
*Responsibilities to be fixed for councillors
*BBMP ground staff to be more accountable for waste collection
*Residents should hand over waste only to door-to-door collectors
*Leaf composting system to be set up in every park
*Waste should not be seen on streets
