A clean street ahead of the rally. Picture by UB Photos

Dec. 17: The Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) is planning to retain the additional workers it had engaged to clean the city ahead of the India-Asean car rally so as to maintain the cleanliness in the days to come.

The corporation is also keen on engaging different non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to carry out an awareness campaign on cleanliness soon.

The city received a facelift ahead of the rally, with the civic authorities going on a beautification drive to make it presentable. Apart from cleaning the roads, a fountain was installed below the Ganeshguri flyover and all bus stops painted.

While usually roadside garbage bins in several localities of the city are seen overflowing with trash, for a change, the bins were cleared regularly during the past few days.

As the current lot of municipal workers could clear the roadside garbage bins only once a day, the GMC had engaged additional workers to clean these bins twice a day during the past couple of days as part of the preparations to make the city look presentable to host the car rally.

“While our workers used to clean the roads and clear garbage bins once a day, we had engaged additional workers to work double shifts ahead of the car rally. This helped in keeping the city clean to a great extent. Therefore, we are planning to retain these additional workers apart from a current staff. The city is large and it is practically not possible for the current lot of workers to clear the garbage bins in each and every locality here twice a day. But having additional manpower will definitely help in dividing the work load so that it is carried out efficiently,” GMC deputy commissioner Kavita Padmanavan said.

“Since many people have a tendency to throw trash on the road, this only worsens the situation. We are also planning to start an awareness campaign so as to educate the masses on how they can contribute in keeping the city clean. We are planning to engage different NGOs which will be responsible for educating and motivating the public to avoid littering open spaces and make efficient use of garbage bins. These NGOs will pay door-to-door visits in different localities and speak to the families on these issues. We hope this will yield definite results,” Padmanavan said.

The corporation will target the GS Road in the initial phase of the campaign, as it happens to be one of the busiest roads in the city.

Gradually, the campaign will be extended to cover the entire city.