The Hindu : Waste management to go into private hands

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 02, 2003

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Waste management to go into private hands

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI APRIL 1. Private sector's participation in management and segregation of solid waste in six of the 12 Zones of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi would create additional job opportunities for 15,000 people in the Capital, the Municipal Commissioner, Rakesh Mehta, claimed here today.

Addressing a Press conference here to announce the beginning of the privatisation process in this regard, Mr. Mehta said not a single safai karamchari would become surplus due to this. "This would create more job opportunities,'' he said. The strong union of safai karamcharis in the MCD have launched a movement against the privatisation process with the argument that it would render many of their colleagues jobless after the private players enter the Capital's sanitary system. The Additional Commissioner (CSE), Ramesh Negi, was also present on the occasion.

Mr. Mehta announced that the entire process was expected to be completed by the end of July and the final award of contract was expected to be given by August 15. The private companies would be responsible for the design and maintenance of separate collection mechanism of the solid waste and its transportation to sanitary landfill sites in six of the 12 MCD Zones: West, South, Central, Karol Bagh, Sadar Paharganj and City Zone. The six Zones totalling 445 sq. km generates 3,132 tonnes of garbage per day.

Hoping that the best national and international companies would come forward to participate in the Capital's solid waste management including its segregation, Mr. Mehta said: "Request for qualification (RFQ) document could be purchased from April 4 onwards. Our sole purpose is to create an efficient and effective garbage collection, storage, transfer and disposal system in Delhi.''

Informing that only a limited number of firms were providing integrated solid waste management services in India, he disclosed the applicants could be a single or a group of entities, coming together to implement the project. The civic body is asking for experienced parties in areas of conservancy and fleet logistics, equipment supply / construction activity related to conservancy and fleet logistics dealing with government agencies involving community applications. "The contract would be awarded for eight years,'' he said.

Replying to queries, the Commissioner said he envisaged an investment of about Rs. 120 crores by the private companies in next eight years. He said in the pre-transportation, the operator would be designing, procuring, operating and maintaining a system including equipment and vehicles for solid waste collected from door-to-door to the `dhalao' and transfer stations in a segregated manner.

The operator would be redesigning the existing `dhalaos' and dustbins to allow segregation and storage of waste, design and construction of transfer stations / sorting and recycling centre at a site identified by the MCD. The private players were also expected to design a transportation system and equipment to allow for transportation of waste in covered containers with a colour coding for biodegradable and recyclable and other dry waste.

They are expected to upgrade, operate and maintain transport workshop, procure all equipment, machinery and vehicles for the system, Mr. Mehta said.

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