ROURKELA: Residents of Rourkela can now send photographs of unattended garbage heaps on streets to the Rourkela Municipal Corporation (RMC) and get rid of filth instantly. In its bid to transform Rourkela into a Smart City, the civic body has launched two mobile applications through which, people can bring to fore the sewerage and garbage disposal issues in their areas. The applications are Swachchha Rourkela App and Smart Rourkela App.
While the Swachchha Rourkela App is meant to monitor garbage and debris collection, the Smart Rourkela App enables residents to lodge grievances of any kind with the RMC Commissioner and also check on the status of the grievance.
Users can upload picture of unattended garbage or debris heap and send it to RMC for action. The sanitary inspector concerned will be accountable to immediately remove garbage or debris and report back to RMC with a picture of the cleaned spot.
Available for both Android and Windows platform, the applications can be downloaded from www.rmc.nin.in site.
The initiative comes at a time when the RMC has been making futile attempts to prevent garbage and debris dumping on roads. Several efforts, including privatisation of sanitary services in nine wards, have not yielded any results.
Recently, the RMC announced to impose fine on unauthorised dumping of building debris on roads, but no penal provision has been made for garbage dumping. Sanitary services of nine out of the 33 wards of the RMC have been privatised, but monitoring has not been effective. RMC Commissioner DP Mohapatra said the Swachchha Rourkela App would strengthen monitoring with public participation. He said action would be taken immediately on receipt of complain.
Once the picture is uploaded, an alert message will be automatically generated and reach the sanitary inspector concerned besides the RMC administration if garbage heaps are not cleared by 10 am. The RMC also plans to procure a garbage compactor and 100 new mechanical dustbins to boost sanitary services.