The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Mudichur panchayat takes solid measures to become a model body

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Apr 01, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Mudichur panchayat takes solid measures to become a model body

K. Manikandan

Residents, staff join hands for waste management

— Photo: A. Muralitharan

SETTING AN EXAMPLE: Members of women self-help groups collecting garbage from a house in Mudichur panchayat near Tambaram. — Photo: A. Muralitharan .

TAMBARAM : In an inspiring initiative, residents, staff and elected representatives of Mudichur village panchayat near Tambaram and the Kancheepuram district administration have come together to adopt sound practices of solid waste management.

The panchayat shot into limelight after Nirmala Bhaskar, former president, received a national award for the best administered rural local body in 1998. Like any other panchayat or urban local body in the southern suburbs of Chennai, this panchayat was dumping garbage in open spaces. Now, a compost yard to convert kitchen waste into manure is in place. Collection of garbage segregated at source from all houses is to begin soon and training of women self-help groups is on for this purpose.

P. Damodaran, panchayat president, said that a door-to-door collection of garbage started a few years ago and covered about 30 houses initially.

With the support and cooperation of residents, the panchayat is now covering 915 houses. An amount of Rs. 20 is collected from each household to pay workers and meet expenses of vehicles' maintenance. And in order to implement solid waste management principles, the panchayat initiated source segregation measures recently. Self-Help groups — Roja and Sakthi — are being trained to promote the concept.

Indra Kumar, senator of Exnora International in Pammal, would train women members of the two groups, apart from demonstrating the process of source segregation and conversion of kitchen waste into manure through organic composting.

On the Republic Day this year, Kancheepuram Collector Pradeep Yadav handed over Rs. 4.4 lakh to the panchayat. The amount would be used to purchase tricycles and bins, which would be distributed to residents, and for constructing parking sheds for the tricycles, Mr. Damodaran said.

A shed constructed earlier has been renovated and is ready for the purpose of vermin-composting, he pointed out.

``Our aim is to cover all the 2,542 houses in the panchayat and to create awareness of the importance of keeping the entire locality free from garbage,'' Mr. Damodaran said.

He hoped that in a few months, the village would be a model to other rural and urban local bodies on the city's fringes.

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