CHENNAI: While Zone-II of Greater Chennai Corporation, Manali, claims to have achieved 100 per cent solid waste segregation at source, the situation at the ground level tells a different story.
Lack of proper and adequate equipment to segregate garbage has resulted in piling up of waste for the last one week. The worst hit is ward 18.
On paper, each of the seven wards in Manali (from 15 to 21) has close to 50 workers to collect and segregate waste. However, the workers say, on the ground, only half their number are actually deployed. While it takes around five or more workers to manually segregate waste at the collection point in ward 18, only one or two workers are assigned with this task every day. “We couldn’t fully segregate the garbage in the last five days because there were a very few of us here. But, our supervisor told us that we have to finish the work on Sunday or we will lose our jobs,” said a conservancy worker from division 18.
However, corporation officials say there is a shortage of staff only when a few of them take leave. “We have a total of 356 workers on ground to collect and segregate waste. Sometimes, there are a handful of people who take leave, but other than that we have enough staff. Also, only eight to nine tonnes of waste go to the Kodungaiyur landfill from Manali,” Zonal Officer of Manali told Express.
Shortage of manpower at the segregation site has led to the accumulation of unsegregated solid waste, which is finally dumped in open grounds nearby to show less tonnage of solid waste going to the landfills. “Without segregating the waste, we are asked to empty the trash we collected in the grounds nearby. This is why the corporation trucks also never come. It came today (Sunday) after a month because it rained yesterday,” said another conservancy worker from ward 18.
But the conservancy supervisor said that they have extra staff on standby to assist on the days , when workers take leave. “The workers delay in collecting waste from the residents and, due to this, they don’t have time to segregate the unsegregated waste, resulting in piling up of around 500-800 kg of waste. We have around 40 staff in every division and don’t need anymore,” he said.
Understaffed
Each of the seven wards in Manali has close to 50 workers, but the workers say only half their number are actually deployed. While it takes around five or more workers to manually segregate waste at the collection point in ward 18, only one or two workers are assigned with this task every day.