In recent times Goa has been fed with a lot of noise – an addition to the existing Noise Pollution, about the garbage issue rather than any solution to the problem. Despite the PM’s Swachh Bharat moves over the last few years, the tiny but beautiful State of Goa has only gone from bad to worse. The Sonsoddo has been in the news for a few decades with no solution in sight. The lesser known mountainous garbage dump of Sada at Mormugao is another eye-sore feeding sufficient toxic gases to Vasco. A drive along the Airport-Verna highway will prove that we are way off from becoming an Open Defecation Free (ODF) State.
The garbage along the Margao by-pass road is a disgrace to the State’s waste management authorities and local citizens. These are but a few examples of the reality that the State is faced with. The sad part is that we do not see any light at the end of the tunnel and if serious and positive action is not taken soon, we could soon have epidemics of uncontrollable nature in the Golden Goa of yore.
Of late, we’ve been reading a lot about the way the authorities handled the garbage dump in the city of Indore. A dynamic IAS officer Asheesh Singh almost single handedly got rid of 13 lakh metric tonnes of garbage within a period of just 6 months and managed to convert the dump site into a beautiful Golf Course. While the initial estimated cost of the work quoted at over Rs 65 crores, using hired equipment and their own resources the 13 lacks tonnes of garbage was cleared within a period of 6 months between May and December 2018 at a cost of just Rs 10 cr. This, as compared to the 2 lakh tonnes that had taken over 2 years, to clear during the earlier period. The value of the reclaimed land, is today estimated at Rs 400 crores. If Indore can do it, why can’t Goa?
How was it done?
Speaking to an Organisation called The Better India, Asheesh Singh said that Bio-remediation or bio-mining is an environmentally friendly technique to separate soil and recyclables like plastic, metal, paper, cloth and other solid materials from legacy waste. Further, he added that the topmost layer in a landfill is usually dusty and may have several materials that are still in the active biological state. This layer needs to be stabilised using herbal or biological sanitisers. The sanitized layer is then raked through to pull out rags, plastic, rubber, textile, etc. Since they required a large number of heavy machinery, they decided to take the trommels, screens, excavators, backhoe loaders on rent and operated by utilising their own resources.
The recyclables recovered from the bio-mining process was sent for recycling, recyclable polythene was sent to cement plants and also for road making. The soil recovered was used for refilling the ground on the same site where greenery is being developed.
Asheesh Singh has shown us that if the right resources are employed and if our administration decides to take up such jobs seriously, landfills can efficiently be transformed into green and clean places. It is time we get people like Asheesh Singh to come to Goa and guide us how to handle our mess.
