After being taken to task by the Karnataka High Court over improper and inadequate solid waste management, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is actively exploring the possibility of having a second shift for waste collection to ensure that garbage does not lie festering on the streets.
Currently, the BBMP's pourakarmikas pick up waste (door-to-door collection) between 7 a.m. and 2 p.m. However, many residents and even commercial establishments who are not able to hand over the waste they generate to these pourakarmikas for various reasons, are dumping it indiscriminately across the city, thereby resulting in black spots.
BBMP's Special Commissioner (Solid Waste Management and Health) Sarfaraz Khan told The Hindu that a few residents' welfare groups had suggested starting a second shift - post 5 p.m. - for waste pick-up to reduce indiscriminate dumping of waste. The idea, he said, was to have waste picked up later in the day, especially in areas with high footfalls and a large number of commercial establishments.
“This is still in the early stage and needs to be fleshed out. We hope to include this in the micro-plan for solid waste management, and also in the new garbage tenders that are currently being drafted,” he said.
He added that BBMP commissioner N. Manjunath Prasad would most likely place the subject, once it is finalised, before the BBMP council. “The council will have to take a call on the subject first,” he said.
Waste management experts, however, are divided in their opinion about this proposal.
Sandya Narayan, member of the Solid Waste Management Round Table, said that experts had been actively proposing introducing a second shift in waste pick-up from smaller commercial establishments, such as eateries and shops, based on a user fee model. “That way, the BBMP will not have to spend anything and the small commercial establishments don't have to spend too much to manage the waste they generate,” she said and explained that the small commercial establishments don't have the resources that bigger ones have to go in for an agreement with an empanelled vendor for waste management. “It is because of this that there is indiscriminate dumping of waste,” she maintained.
N.S. Ramakanth, who was earlier part of the BBMP's Expert Committee on SWM, disagreed and pointed out that the city market area is being cleaned in three shifts, yet, there is hardly any difference on the ground. “Change can be expected only if everybody segregates waste at source and if violators are penalised. The BBMP has now appointed marshals, who are mostly ex-servicemen, to catch the violators and penalise them,” he said. He suggested the BBMP act as a facilitator and help small commercial establishments to jointly get a vendor to pick up waste at their own cost. This, he maintained, was the only way forward.
