BENGALURU: The black spots and piled-up garbage at collection and mustering centres, along with the seepage of waste water underground, are not just causing inconvenience to citizens but are also violating people's constitutional rights.
It is also an violation of the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act of 1981 and the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act of 1974.
Justice Subhash B Adi, Chairman of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) State Level Committee, in his recent report – Present Status Report on Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike, submitted to the Tribunal, pointed to grave anomalies in waste management by the city corporation.
Justice Adi told The New Indian Express: “Waste still continues to go to dumpsites when there is already crores of tonnes of legacy waste. There has been no systematic waste management in Bengaluru for the last 15 years and, unfortunately, the corporations want someone else to manage the waste for them, rather than themselves.”
He added: “The piled-up garbages everywhere is a violation of Air, Water and C&D Acts. Violations are happening on a daily basis and now the NGT has again initiated inquiry on this. I will be calling for a meeting of the new five corporation commissioners.”
The report highlighted that the BBMP lacked a definite and effective mechanism for solid waste management (SWM). Consequently, most interior roads, road corners, and open spaces in Bengaluru have become informal waste dump sites.
According to the report, the BBMP claims that Bengaluru generates around 5,000–5,500 tonnes of waste per day (TPD). However, with the city housing 1.02 crore people, this waste has increased to 7,000 TPD, which is not being acknowledged. This indicates that there is no proper quantification of the waste generated, and it cannot be less than what was estimated in 2017.
The report noted: “The corporation has not given importance to the mandatory requirements by encouraging the decentralised processing. There is no known reason as to why BBMP is hesitant to comply with the rules against incurring huge expenditure, with no expected result. The Urban Development Department and the Rural Development and Panchayat Raj appear to have not seriously made an endeavour for ensuring the decentralised processing in the case of group housing, institutions, commercial establishments, educational institutions, temples, choultries, social welfare clubs and other such entities where solid waste could be processed at the source. Similar is the case with special economic zones or industrial estates.”
Adding to this, another NGT member, who wished to remain unnamed, said: “The five corporations are also doing nothing. Decentralising the system has shown no result. The Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) has also done nothing about it, which is dereliction of duty. The two bodies have also been violating the NGT guidelines that garbage should not be dumped but managed and reduced. Everyone stops from jailing the commissioner.”
Dr Meenkashi Bharat, a member of the Solid Waste Management Round Table, said: “The government is not managing the garbage properly. Government should manage garbage and not dump it. Dumping garbage 200 km away from Bengaluru will still contaminate the city's underground water. Government has introduced garbage cess, yet the problem remains the same. Government is unable to enforce the rule of segregation and management at source.”