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Streams in Kotagiri polluted: forum

Special Correspondent

Udhagamandalam: The need to keep the streams in and around Kotagiri clean has been underscored by the Kotagiri Citizens Forum.

Drinking water

Pointing out that Kotagiri had a number of streams which could easily meet the drinking water requirements of the people, the secretary of the Forum, Yasmin Kothavala, has in a communication to the Collector, Santosh K Misra, regretted that many were getting polluted rapidly.

Effluents

Stating that many houses had been constructed along the streams, she said that unfortunately a number of them did not have septic tanks.

Consequently their effluents were let into the stream and residents also dumped their garbage into them. As a result the people living in settlements down stream were forced to consume polluted water.

Manpower shortage

Whenever the issue was taken up with the civic administration the excuse was that manpower shortage was an impediment to removing the garbage.

Adverting to a long pending proposal to implement a garbage management scheme, she regretted that it was yet to materialise.

Garbage bins

In the meantime, the broken and missing garbage bins have not been replaced. Since the vehicles transporting garbage were seldom covered, the waste materials falling from them affected pedestrians and motorists.

Vermicompost

Referring to a proposal to put up a vermicompost plant, she said that it would succeed only if the collection of garbage was done in a systematic manner.

Claiming that even the overall standard of sanitation was far from satisfactory, Ms. Kothavala said that even though the town had only a few public conveniences, they were not cleaned properly.

Open toilets

As a result the people were converting open areas into toilets. The mingling of sewage with storm water posed a major threat to public health.

Repeated representations in this regard to the officials concerned have not produced anything tangible. Since the local body was not able to tackle garbage related problems, the district administration should explore alternatives such as engaging the services of a private agency to manage the waste.

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