With no solution in sight to Pune’s seemingly irresolvable garbage crisis, the residents of the villages of Uruli Devachi and Phursungi have filed a petition with the National Green Tribunal on grounds that their health was being gravely affected by unrestrained dumping there by the Pune Municipal Corporation.
In 1981, the Maharashtra government had allotted 43 acres of land in verdant Uruli and provisioned another 120 acres of land in the village of Phursungi in 2003 to meet the waste-disposal demands of Pune’s indiscriminate urbanisation.
Since, then tensions between the hapless villagers, who bitterly blame the PMC for transforming these once clean villages into incredibly polluted wastelands, and the municipal authorities, have come to a head despite attempted mediation by State authorities.
In their petition, the villagers have squarely charged the PMC for not consciously implementing solid waste management rules at the landfill site that resulted in adverse effects on the villagers’ health.
The villagers have said the provisions of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 and the Municipal Solid Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules, 200 were being flagrantly violated by the municipal authorities.
The NGT has directed the respondents who include the PMC Commissioner, the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board and Hanjer Biotech Energies Pvt Ltd among others to file a reply immediately.
The decrepit state of the PMC- run waste disposal plants in Uruli and Phursungi, which have consumed lakhs of taxpayers’ rupees, have critically aggravated Pune’s waste-disposal problem.
The two plants set up by Hanjer Biotech at Uruli Devachi with a waste-treating capacity of 1,000 tonne, is barely able to process 200 tonne of waste suffering several breakdowns in the process.
On several occasions in the recent past, the residents of these villagers have been forced to go on strikes, barring the entry of PMC garbage disposal vehicles owing to the gravity of the situation.
According to the PMC, Pune generated around 300 tonne garbage daily in 1991, a figure that has soared exponentially to nearly 1,700 tonne, of which around 950 tonne is ostensibly segregated.
The dumping in these villages has polluted the air and water while leading to a dramatic rise is diseases, severely afflicting the health of families there.
In January this year, city-based NGOs had written to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, demanding an anti-corruption bureau (ACB) probe into irregularities plaguing the city’s garbage processing units that had resulted in a full-blown health crisis for the residents of Uruli and Phursungi.
