West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi

KOLKATA: The valley into which Darjeeling's waste is disposed of can be called "the Valley of Garbage or the Valley of Folly," suggests West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi. For, it was here a 10-year-old ragpicker Susmita Sarki was buried alive in an avalanche of filth on February 26.

Conveys condolences

Conveying his condolences to her aged grandmother and brother, Mr. Gandhi regretted that a "rose like life" had been "smothered under a load of filth generated by humans."

The girl, who was picking rag in Darjeeling's main municipal garbage dump, was "martyred to our callous excesses and neglect," the Governor said in a statement on Wednesday.

``I share the blame''

"How did this [the death] happen," Mr. Gandhi asks. "I do not absolve myself of my share of the blame, as I too am part-tourist and part-resident in Darjeeling and, as Governor, have an indirect status in all limbs of Government, including municipal administration."

Mr. Gandhi says all garbage — domestic, municipal, civic, hospital and other — is carried to the edge of the precipice overlooking the valley. From that edge it is tipped over into the hillside. "When the load of the garbage on the slopes becomes too heavy, the laws of gravity work and carry the muck like landslide, hurtling down into the valley."

"The valley has generations of garbage in it now — more than two decades of it," he points out. "This is not a systematically devised landfill, only a natural cavity which is being used for the purpose of doing away with the refuse of the hill station, to remove it from our eye-range."

He says, "Ragpickers forage in that cavity for plastic items which they can sell for a pittance. Susmita, I am told, was doing that when a huge roll of garbage came tumbling on her, extinguishing her little life."

Who is responsible for this? His answer: "No single person or agency is. Visitors to Darjeeling like me who generate debris by reckless consumerism must own their share of the responsibility... . We live for the present moment... and leave this beauty spot having drawn everything Darjeeling has to offer, but giving nothing to it in return. Except, empty packets of crisps and gutka, apart from the water bottles and other plastic containers."

Mr. Gandhi recalls another "sad spectacle" of debris from a building under construction rolling down a hillside, killing occupants of huts in the track of that `malba' slide some months ago. "Darjeeling has to wake up from its apathy if it is to continue to be regarded as a place of beauty," he says.

"If it does not, it will choke on its own runaway explosion of unplanned growth. If we, as Darjeeling's civil society no less than its administration, decide to systematise, regulate and plan our infrastructure better, we will ensure that other Susmitas who should be in school and not [be] rag-picking, are not martyred to our callous excesses and neglect."

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