The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Alandur to privatise segregation of garbage

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Alandur to privatise segregation of garbage

Staff Reporter

Decision taken at Municipal council meeting on Tuesday Bid to comply with Solid Waste Management Rules, 2000, and tackle shortage of conservancy workers

TAMBARAM: The Alandur Municipality has proposed to privatise source segregation of garbage in all the 42 wards. This move is part of efforts to comply with the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2000, and tackle the shortage of conservancy workers in the local body.

This was decided during a routine meeting of the Municipality on Tuesday. A private firm was engaged to handle garbage collection, transfer and disposal in 15 wards for five years and its contract comes to an end next month. And till now, garbage was being cleared without being segregated. If the local body was to comply with the Solid Waste Management Rules — particularly to ensure source segregation of garbage — it would have to take up privatisation on a large scale, said R. S. Bharathi, Municipal Chairman.

There were 33,969 houses in the Municipality and the population was 1,69,845. On the basis of appointing one conservancy worker for source segregation of garbage for every 250 houses, the local body would require 136 staff and they would require an equal number of workers for cleaning streets and clearing the drains.

Shortage of workers

Further, 50 workers were required for loading the segregated garbage in vehicles for taking them to transfer stations and subsequently, the compost yard. There was also a need for about 30 staff for maintaining commercial complexes and vehicles. "The total requirement of conservancy workers for Alandur Municipality is 367 and at present there are only 231. To meet the backlog of vacancies, we need at least another 130 workers," Mr. Bharathi said.

But it had to be ensured that the cost incurred for privatisation for primary collection (source segregation) alone had to be within the amount spent by the Municipality towards the private contractor so long, the Chairman said. He said even among the existing strength of 231 conservancy workers, only about 150 reported for duty everyday due to the high rate of absenteeism.

Dumping of garbage

Councillors spoke about the problems in the Municipality in the absence of a foolproof and scientific method to dispose garbage.

They said garbage was being dumped in open spaces and burial grounds causing severe inconvenience to residents.

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