Stung by the SC remarks, the state government has finally swung into action and decided to revive septage treatment projects, which were in the cold storage. However opposition by locals against these projects may prove to be a stumbling block.
Urban Affairs Minister Manjalamkuzhi Ali said that the sewage-cum-septage treatment plant at Muttathara in Thiruvannathapuram will start functioning in a month.
The plant, with a capacity of 107 MLD, will handle 40 MLD of waste - brought by the city’s centuries’ old drainage pipes - in the initial stage. It will treat sewage as well as septage collected from household septic tanks, which would otherwise be dumped into water bodies. Dumping of toilet waste in public places is a common practice in Kannur. The Edakkad police, last Sunday, registered a case against the owner of a housing quarters for opening toilet waste into public drain. The incident came to light when women workers under the MGNREG scheme, who were deputed to clean the drain, refused to carry out the work citing the presence of toilet waste.
Locals near the Kakkad River, the preferred spot of garbage dumpers in Kannur, recalled an incident where a tanker lorry carrying human excreta tried to run over a group of youngsters who were guarding the river during night.
“The lorry was bearing an Ernakulam registration number,” recalls Ashique, who along with friends who escaped unscathed from the assault.
The Kollam Corporation has identified land in Kureepuzha to set up a sewage treatment plant, but the project is likely to run into rough weather, as the residents are already locked in a bitter fight against a garbage treatment complex in the area. The Kuravanpalam area in Kollam, which has around 400 illegally constructed sheds, rented out to migrant labourers, is the most notorious example for human waste mismanagement.
“The human waste generated by hundreds living in these dingy sheds are disposed through pipes in the open drainage of the Corporation. The waste finally reaches the Ashtamudi Lake. Life is turning hell for the people in the residential areas adjacent to Kuravanpalam,” says local councillor C V Anil Kumar.
Minister Ali admits that Kerala does not have proper facilities for septic waste treatment. “Opening of four septage treatment plants in Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam, Kochi and Kozhikode under the Kerala Sustainable Urban Development Project (KSUDP) will be the first step towards ending the practice,” Ali told Express.
Tendering process for the septage treatment projects in Kochi and Kollam has been completed.
However, opposition from locals have delayed land acquisition process. The government has proposed ‘stand-alone septage treatment plants’ in nine districts with participation of municipalities and district panchayats, Ali said.
“Though 94.6 percentage of households in Kerala have latrines, which is well above national average, proper disposal of waste was ignored. As a result, water bodies are increasingly facing threat of pollution,” said M Dileep Kumar, Director, Suchitwa Mission, which gives support to sanitation activities of local bodies. According to Shibu K Nair, Programme Director of ‘Zero Waste’ project of Thanal, an NGO active in creating awareness on waste management, the government needs to take local people into confidence while setting up septage treatment plants. “The government should focus on setting up small-scale sewage and septage units using bio-degradable techniques in big institutions like government hospitals. This will instill confidence in people about its efficacy and dissuade them from dumping waste from septic tanks in water bodies and open spaces,” he said.
(Inputs from Sovi Vidyadharan, Sucheth P R and Aneesh Das)
