Drinking water pipelines pass through drainage system at Panobika streets in Berhampur. Picture by Gopal Krishna Reddy

Berhampur, July 28: A private company, engaged by the Berhampur Municipal Corporation, has submitted its report on the city’s sanitation plan to the civic body.

“The company surveyed sanitation, water supply, sewerage system, roads and drains in all the 37 wards for the past four months,” said municipal commissioner Bhima Manseth. Its report would be submitted to the urban department and finalised after necessary altercations or modifications, he said.

Bibhas Mahapatra and Ranjan Kumar Mallick of the Bhubaneswar-based company said they had listed detailed problems of all the wards in consultation with the councillors. The company’s aim is to make the city pollution-free and initiate steps for development of its sanitation programme under the Centre’s city sanitation plan.

“The city needs more community latrines as many people still defecate out in the open. This practice must be stopped. The city has 18 community latrines and there are three public urinals at Old Bus Stand, City Hospital and Bada Bazar. We have also surveyed the condition of drains and roads in the city. At some places, there are no drains and we have put forward some proposals,” he said.

Mayor Siba Shankar Das said they were committed to make Berhampur a prosperous and pollution-free corporation. “We have privatised sanitation in 15 wards. This number would be increased to 20 soon,” he said.

At present, the corporation manages 450km of roads and 450km of drain. Sanitation was privatised in 15 wards. “Privatisation has definitely yielded good results,” health officer Subhakanta Das said. The corporation has 759 sweepers and drain cleaners that include 371 regular and 388 casual staff.

“Considering the national average, which states that two sweepers are needed to clean and maintain half-a-km of road and drain, we require a total of 1,800 sweepers in Berhampur. But, we are managing with only 759 of them. We have vehicles to transport garbage,” said the health officer.

“We are dumping garbage at Chandini Hills near Sukunda Math spread over 20 acres. The place is 10km from the corporation office and the garbage vehicles are making two trips a day to dispose of the waste,” said Das.

The corporation, which generates about 150 tonnes of garbage a day, had earlier initiated steps to set up a garbage disposal plant for Rs 80 crore at Chandini Hills.