l GSPCB accuses Calangute panchayat of not picking up plastic for baling l Felicitates 47 other panchayats for their plastic collection initiative l Calangute panch hits back, says GSPCB Chairman ‘doesn’t know what’s going on’
SHWETA KAMAT
PANJIM: The Solid Waste Management Cell of the Goa Pollution Control Board on Thursday felicitated 47 panchayats and municipal bodies for taking up the initiative of collecting and bailing the non-recyclable waste but the tourist-centric Calangute panchayat did not figure on the list, officials said.
“The Calangute panchayat never responded to our proposal,” GSPCB Chairman Jose Manuel Noronha reiterated today even as the Calangute panchayat maintained its stand that it was indeed collecting and sending off its plastic to be baled.
The Board reiterated that the Calangute Panchayat had failed to respond to the request made by their Solid Waste Management cell (SWMC) to collect non-recyclable waste.
However, long-time panch and de-facto power center of the panchayat Joseph Sequeira was at his combative best rubbishing the Board’s claims.
“Who says that we do not collect the plastic? We are collecting garbage and sending it,” he said, asking, “How can the authorities and the Pollution Control chairman say such things. I don’t think he knows what is going on.’’
According to him, the panchayat undertakes a plastic cleaning drive every Sunday.
But this is not the first time the two have locked horns
In 2012, the GSPCB had issued show cause notices to the Calangute Panchayat on the use of a site on the Saligao plateau for disposing garbage. GSPCB has said that the
panchayat was found dumping garbage without segregation, treatment and composting or management of garbage resulting in severe environmental pollution in the vicinity.
The GSPCB in June 2013 had signed memorandum of understanding (MoU) with a Karnataka-based cement manufacturing company, Vasavadatta Cement, to get rid of plastic waste generated in the State and had accordingly expressed their willingness to collect non-recyclable waste from all the municipalities and panchayats on demand.
According to Noronha, as per the proposal, the SWMC would collect the waste, bale it at its bailing stations either at Sarvona in Bicholim or Kakoda in Curchorem and then transport it to Vasavadatta Cement for treating it.
Quite clearly as the blame game continues, Herald undertakes to find out who is speaking the truth.
