Cuttack, Jan. 17: The civic body will shortly introduce user fees for collection of garbage from city residents.

The user fee collection is part of the Solid Waste Management Project, 2016, for streamlining the city's sanitation. Civic officials have already chalked out separate fee slabs for the purpose.

The Cuttack Municipal Corporation has decided to charge Rs 30 per month for solid waste collection from houses that measure up to 500sqft. For houses that measure between 500sqft and 1200sqft, the user fee will be Rs 50 per month, while it will be Rs 100 in the case of houses sized between 1200sqft and 3000sqft. For houses that are even larger, the user fee will be decided based on actual measurement of the plots.

In case of commercial buildings, the base monthly rate has been fixed at Rs 60 for any shop or office measuring up to 100sqft. For commercial area measuring between 200sqft and 500sqft, the fee will be Rs 150. It will Rs 400 for areas sized between 500sqft to 1000sqft. For guesthouses, hotels, restaurants and bars covering more than 1,000sqft area, the user fee will be Rs 750 per month. Fore even bigger commercial areas, the fee will be more than Rs 1,000 per month.

"The municipal council had approved imposition of user fee for collection of solid waste on November 30 last year. We have already conducted a survey that was required for implementation of the plan. We will collect user fee after the contract for garbage collection is awarded to a new party as part of implementation of our Solid Waste Management Project, 2016," municipal commissioner Gyana Das told The Telegraph today.

The corporation cleared the technical bids of two private companies - one from Mumbai and the other from Bangalore - for consideration of their financial bids for awarding the contract for garbage collection and disposal work in September last year.

"But we have not been able to proceed further due to interim restriction which the high court has issued on a petition challenging the tender process. We hope to be able to award the contract in first week of February once we cross the legal hurdle," Das said.

City residents seemed okay with the idea of paying garbage disposal fees to the civic body if that ensured cleanliness.

"I don't mind paying fee to the civic body if it ensures regular door-to-door waste collection," said Sri Vihar resident Alaka Patnaik.

"Garbage lying strewn all over the roadsides has been a common sight in the city. Sanitation measures should improve once the civic body starts charging us for collection of garbage," said Badambadi resident Prafulla Mohanty.

The civic administration wants to reorganise the city's sanitation management through inclusion of penalty provisions in the new contract for service-level violations.

"A wide range of penalty provisions have been included to ensure that the private operator, who gets the contract this time, does not work sloppily," said Bikash Ranjan Behera, head of the municipal corporation's standing committee for licence and appeal.

"To monitor sanitation work across the city, ward committees will be formed in all the 59 wards," he added.