Alleging that the untreated municipal solid waste was being dumped along with processed waste in the inert pit outside the private company in Chettichavadi, village people blocked the road and refused to allow the Corporation vehicles to dump the garbage here on Friday.
Villagers demanded that a local area environment monitoring committee be constituted for inspecting the company, fix time limit for corporation vehicles to pass through the village and relocate the plant within a time frame.
They alleged that since the accumulation of untreated garbage is very high and the company has no capacity to process it, the garbage is dumped in the inert pit and covered with processed garbage.
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M. Kannan, Inspector of Police, Kannankurichi police station and the company officials took the villagers to the dumped area and explained that both processed and unprocessed garbage are dumped separately.
Police personnel said that if villagers found violations in the functioning of the company, they could approach a court of law and seek justice. But villagers entered into an argument with the police and said that they would not allow the vehicles to proceed.
Assistant Commissioner of Police Udhaya Kumar warned of action if villagers continued to block the vehicles and create trouble. Only later did the villagers withdraw their protest. About 20 vehicles that had been blocked entered the plant.
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Due to non-functioning of the plant, a meeting was conducted recently by the district administration and an agreement was reached to run the plant.
The plant began its operation on Thursday but the villagers continued to frequently block the vehicles.
Police personnel were posted in the village to prevent untoward incidents.