The area is Vengalrao Nagar, and a woman in plain sari accosts a youth on a two-wheeler.
“Take a video and tell sir,” she tells someone beside and turns to the pleading youth. A banner tied a few metres behind him reads ‘Penalty of ₹1,000-₹10,000 will be imposed if you litter here.’
The youth has trash in a plastic bag tied to his motorbike, which he would have thrown at the site had the woman not stopped him. The person tells her that he was littering the place because there was already trash there.
“Would you throw another note there if someone throws a ₹100 note?” she responds, rendering the youth disarmed.
Self help group volunteers posted at hundreds of garbage vulnerable points (GVPs) across the city have been doing this every day since 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., in order to dissuade irresponsible littering of public spaces and to bridge the gap between Swachh Auto Tipper (SAT) vehicles and households for effective door-to-door garbage collection.
Garbage Vulnerable Points (GVPs) are where trash keeps piling up despite clearance by the garbage trucks every day, especially after the removal of dumper bins from the city as part of Swachh Survekshan rankings.
Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) received Swachh Survekshan awards for 2023 as the ninth cleanest city and a five-star rated garbage-free city.
According to the official figures, the city had 2,309 GVPs, to remove which the corporation’s Sanitation department, with support from the Urban Community Development wing, has taken up Basti Action Plans.
As part of the plan, GVP Elimination Groups have been formed with volunteers from the SHGs, who will take turns to stand guard at the GVPs to ward off littering and to educate people.
The volunteers also note down areas which do not have coverage by SAT vehicles, so that the gaps can be filled.
So far, a total of 1,379 slums have been linked up with GVPs, and with regard to 1,139 slums, the weekly action plan has been completed, which means that they all have been linked with the SAT vehicles. As a result, 583 locations where trash regularly piles up are now said to be litter free. The exercise is not devoid of its downside though.
Primary collection of garbage has always been a challenge for GHMC as it has practically no control over the SAT vehicles. The corporation heavily subsidises loans for purchase of the vehicles for people from underprivileged backgrounds, who engage them in door-to-door garbage collection for a fee.
However, the arrangement leaves a large number of slums out of coverage as SAT drivers are reluctant to go there. There are a total 4,848 SAT vehicles for coverage of 22 lakh households in the city, averaging at 454 households per vehicle.
“We fixed a fee of ₹50 per month per household but now they are collecting upwards of ₹100 per household. They have become a mafia of sorts with some of them holding up to 4,000 households and refusing to part with some even while they are unable to cover them. Organising them as per the city’s needs has been beyond our control due to various factors,” shared an official pleading anonymity.
