Patna: Residents in Kankerbagh circle of Patna Municipal Corporation heaved a sigh of relief as the authorities started door-to-door garbage collection in ward number 41 on Saturday.
So far the programme has resumed only in five wards of the circle, said executive officer of Kankerbagh circle Vijay Kumar Upadhyay. He said the programme will be restarted in the remaining wards of his circle once the system is strengthened. "Right now we have limited resources, because of which we are not able to re-start the facility in all wards. Once we get adequate machine and infrastructure, we will re-start the programme in the remaining wards," he said.
The door-to-door garbage collection programme has been re-started in Bankipore circle too, but not in the remaining two circles. The programme was stopped in Patna last month after termination of two agencies, Patna-based Nishka Security and Intelligence Services and Delhi-based People's Association for Total Help and Youth Applause (Patheya), whom PMC had roped in for the programme. Both agencies started working under the programme in April last year but their services were terminated after they failed to execute the programme properly. PMC has now decided to resume the programme with the help of its own resources and the programme would be run and managed by the corporation on its own till any new agency is hired for the job.
Under the new system, Chalant Kachra Sangrah (mobile garbage collection), introduced by the corporation, auto tippers and other vehicles or the corporation is visiting lanes and collecting garbage from households. The corporation's vehicles are also supposed to inform people when they will be arriving for garbage collection by playing audio songs with lyrics such as: Kachra lao, kachra lao (bring garbage, bring garbage).
The executive officer of the New Capital circle of PMC, Shailesh Kumar, said the programme will resume in his circle in a day or two but it would be started only in one or two wards at first. "Patheya has not returned our vehicles yet," Shailesh said.
The urban development and housing department has initiated the process of setting up a plant to convert solid waste into compost and electricity. Sources said a US-based agency has also given a proposal to the department for converting municipal waste into energy. As per its proposal, it can produce 6,500 megawatt of power, 200 million litres of bio-diesel and 300 million litres of drinking water using 1,500 metric tonnes of solid waste and 600 million litres of wet waste.
The agency had also communicated that it could further convert bio-diesel into bio-fuel whose supply would be given to households and would be much cheaper than LPG. However, the department has decided to go for proper tendering process to select an agency to set up the plant.
Vimla Sinha, a resident of ward number-41, said she was forced to dump her garbage in front of her house when the programme was called off. "The agency started the programme with much fanfare but it ended after a few months. After that all of us were literally dumping garbage in front of our houses," Vimla said. "We are relieved that the service has resumed but we are keeping our fingers crossed."
Raj Kumar Mishra, a Boring Road resident and resident of ward number-21 said he was waiting for the door-to-door garbage collection programme to start in his locality. "The corporation claimed it had roped in agencies for the programme but we never found private agencies in our locality. They never took away garbage even though this one of the posh localities. We hope our ward is not left out this time," Raj Kumar said.
