The civic body believes it has performed “satisfactorily” during the weeklong cleanliness drive after Patna High Court pulled it up while hearing a PIL on poor sanitation in the capital.

In a report submitted to the court on Thursday, the Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC) outlined the works carried out to clean the city in the past seven days. The report stated the efforts undertaken to drain out excess rainwater from various localities after the heavy downpour between September 13 and 18.

“We told the court how sanitation work in the city was being reviewed and supervised ward-wise every day by senior officers. Five sanitation inspectors were sacked for dereliction of duty. Keeping the city clean is our topmost priority and job,” said Shailesh Chandra Diwakar, officer-on-special-duty, PMC.

The division bench, comprising Justice T. Meena Kumari and Justice Chakradhari Sharan Singh, expressed “overall satisfaction” on the corporation’s progress report.

During the hearing of the PIL on September 21, the court had asked the PMC commissioner and other officials to clear the garbage from the city and flush out water from the localities flooded after heavy rainfall.

Diwakar, the PMC, officer said the corporation had tried to follow the court’s directions to the “best of its capacity”.

“We received 72 complaints from advocates of the high court last week. Around 53 complaints have been taken care of. It would take us a few weeks to address a few complaints but they would be resolved,” the officer added.

The court had asked the civic body to cover open manholes and catch pits as they turn into death traps during waterlogging. The civic body told the court that it had started to identify and cover the open manholes in the PMC’s jurisdiction.

The court ordered the PMC authorities to make people aware of civic cleanliness and asked them to conduct fogging in various localities. It also directed them to get the sewerage and drainage plan ready at the earliest and act on public complaints.

The PMC informed the court that it would introduce an interactive-voice-recording system to lodge the complai- nts apart from the toll-free numbers.

Residents were sceptic about the sustainability of the PMC’s efforts, though.

“Important roads and roundabouts in the city are cleaner these days as the PMC has been slogging to comply with the high court’s directive. But little has changed in the colonies. I doubt that the PMC will be able to continue with this momentum for long. It acts only when the court cracks the whip but gets sluggish soon after. This has happened many a times in the past,” said Virendra Kumar Sharma, a resident of Buddha Colony.