In the

 

absence of any designated dumping site, the Dhanbad Municipal Corporation (DMC) is all set to revive the much-touted solid waste management project, which has been stuck in limbo since January last year when the A2Z Solid Waste Management Private Limited withdrew services from the district.

A team from the state-owned infrastructure development company, Jharkhand Infrastructure Corporation Limited (Jinfra), will visit Dhanbad next week to assess the scope for relaunching the Rs 55-crore solid waste project that was sanctioned as a part of the millennium city project under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM).

Speaking to The Telegraph, Dhanbad mayor Chandrashekhar Agarwal said that the Jinfra team would prepare the detailed project report within six months.

Under the solid waste management project, the civic body will install a waste recycling plant and a large dump yard on a 38-acres land at Putki. The plot, about 20km from Dhanbad district headquarters, was handed over to the civic body by BCCL in May for a period of 30 years.

Owing to procedural and legal hurdles in tendering process, the project, which was sanctioned in 2010, could begin only in September 2012 with the selection of A2Z Waste Management as the implementing agency. A2Z, however, withdrew its services from Dhanbad in less than 13 months in January 2014 following disputes with the civic body over poor cleanliness and delay in payment of bills.

After A2Z walked out, the civic body took up the responsibility of sanitation work in 33 wards of Dhanbad, Sindri and Chatatand circles while it sought the help of anther civic body, Mineral Area Development Authority (Mada), to keep the remaining 22 wards of Jharia and Katras circles clean.

However, acute shortage of manpower forced the civic body to rope in private agencies for supplying workers.

Till the solid waste project comes up, residents fear that overflowing drains and unattended garbage will continue to mound across the coal town.