Kerala   

Hostility to garbage plant brewing

K.P.M. Basheer

BRAHMAPURAM: The standoff between Kochi Corporation and the Brahmapuram villagers has eased after the Government decided on Tuesday not to dump garbage at the open site anymore, but last week’s incidents have hardened public opinion against locating the garbage treatment plant in the village.

While the villagers had been ambivalent about a supposedly modern garbage facility coming up in their midst before last week’s events, now most of the residents say an emphatic no to the facility. In October last, at a meeting called by the Ernakulam Collector, and attended by Kunnathunad and Ernakulam MLAs, the villagers had agreed to the setting up of the plant that was expected to take care of hundreds of tonnes of garbage generated by Kochi every day. But, now the villagers’ mood has changed.

Last week, armed with a favourable High Court order and police escort, dozens of garbage trucks had dumped several tonnes of garbage on the 37-acre land owned by Kochi Corporation at Challippaadam. Fearing opposition, the police had rounded up the men in the locality and women were asked to remain indoors. A protesting mob was lathicharged.

The stench from the dumping yard and the garbage trucks had driven the 53 families living in the Chellippaadam neighbourhood out of their homes and forced them to take refuge in a nearby school on Friday.

Though the people The Hindu spoke to cited mainly environmental and health reasons for their opposition to the garbage facility, the undercurrent of ‘outraged village pride’ seems to have turned them against it. Kochi’s ‘big brotherly attitude’ has offended them. But, apart from the outraged pride, environmental concern has been gaining increased attention of both the villagers and activists.

Environmental activists are appalled that the authorities have chosen a site so close to a large water body to locate a garbage treatment plant.

The site is on the edge of the Kadambrayar, which is a source of water for nearby panchayats as well as a host of industries such as Infopark. The proposed Smart City project, a stone’s throw away from the site, will rely on the Kadambrayar for its water needs. The site is close to the confluence of three water bodies: the Kadambrayar and Chitrappuzha streams and the Manakkathodu creek. During the monsoon season, the garbage facility site, the adjoining rice fields and the water bodies all turn into one.

Environmental activists have now called for an environmental impact assessment (EIA) before Kochi Corporation starts work on the garbage facility.

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