CHENNAI: Aachaiyah Pillai, a resident of Medavakkam, never segregated waste. It was a daily battle with the municipality workers, who refused to collect unsegregated garbage, and she was forced to dispose of it herself. “Many residents would throw the waste where the municipal dustbin was placed earlier. Some would even burn it. Eventually, that practice stopped because of the rodents and cattle that the garbage was attracting. The stench had become intolerable. Finally, our Residents Welfare Association (RWA) had a meeting in October 2019 and we were asked to segregate waste or face a fine of `1,000 towards the RWA. Ever since, most residents began the process,” she says.
Baby steps
In an effort to encourage residents to segregate waste at the source, the Pallavaram Municipality decided to get rid of common dustbins in several areas in south Chennai in November 2019. The move was backed by the decision to increase the number of municipal workers in each area. “We are working towards establishing a door-to-door garbage collection system so that the waste is easy to dispose of, and we can ensure that proper techniques of disposal are practised,” said Baskaran Singaravelu, zonal officer at Pallikaranai dumpyard. But the practice is yet to catch on in other parts of the city. A month after the dustbins were removed, the municipality officials found that residents in Pamal, Kovilambakkam and Perungudi, were still not segregating waste. The streets here had mountains of garbage. “We realised that these areas have a high population of office-going bachelors, who didn’t find the time to segregate,” said Govindraj, sanitary officer at Pallavaram Municipality office. The civic workers put up signboards around these areas to help spread awareness.
Lack of time
“I share a 3-BHK with two of my colleagues. We all have different shift timings. I leave home at 7 am. My colleagues come back from work at 9 am. When the municipal workers arrive at 8 am to collect the waste, no one is at home. We fill our garbage in large bags. When two or three are filled to the brim, we dispose of it at a nearby landfill, in the hope that the workers will pick it up. I know many people living in Nanganallur who face the same problem. If we could have someone come twice a day to collect the garbage, we wouldn’t mind segregating our waste,” said Bharat Singhal, an IT professional staying in Nanganallur.
Workers’ woes
The landfill where Bharat and his roommates throw garbage is one of the five in the area that municipal workers are forced to clear once a week. “We start collecting waste at 6 am every day. By the time we get done with the collection, it’s 12 pm. After lunch, we go around clearing garbage from these landfills. It’s double the work for us and we get questioned by our senior officials if they see garbage dumped on the street,” said Prashanti, a municipal worker in Nanganallur.
Landfills, empty plots and waterbodies are commonly used to dump unsegregated garbage. A thin stream of water flows from the Kilkattalai lake, into a pond near Thenmozhi Nagar, just off the Madipakkam Main Road. The section of the pond that faces a residential area is littered with white plastic bags filled with garbage. A few have been torn open by animals and their contents roll into the stream, eventually reaching the lake and contaminating it. “I have been a resident here for the last five years. The pond has been used as a dumping ground even before I shifted. Despite the increase in the number of municipality workers, it remains as littered as it was back then.
Residents have gotten used to disposing of their garbage here and now it has become a habit. Our association is yet to address the issue,” said Bimal Abrar, a resident of Thenmozhi Nagar. The idea to have a door-to-door garbage collection system in place does imbibe waste segregation in most households. Yet, a behavioural change is the need of the hour as only then will the system work. With this system, not only will we be able to manage our waste, we will also find safer and environment-friendly ways of disposal.
Areas without bins