So much for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat and the Margao Municipal Council adopting the Swachh Bharat campaign on all its garbage collection drive posters and pamphlets. But Margao’s Gandhi Market in the heart of Margao city is filthy, stinking, laden with uncollected garbage but there seems to be no municipality to pick up the garbage.
“We pay sopo tax on a daily basis through a municipality appointed agent but the municipality has failed to provide us with any service even though we provide the highest revenue amongst the markets. It’s baffling how the market is so filthy and the garbage collection is so erratic,” explains Rohit Naik, who has been a third generation sleeping mat merchant in the market.
Rohit points out that the migrant vegetable vendors are the real menace in the market and don’t deserve a spot in the market with the vegetable market shifted to the SGPDA complex near Fatorda-Colva circle.
While Indru Yellipa explains that the municipality has no system to collect the garbage, they have just created one space for it to be dumped and even worse, that room is open to cattle and other stray animals. “We dump all our vegetable waste there. The meat and beef vendors drop the animal carcasses, fat and even skin and that attracts the dogs and the birds and then the garbage is strewn all over the area. Why can’t the MMC put a proper wall or install a fence around the garbage room?” questions Indru who feels that the garbage menace is not a migrant versus non migrant issue.
“We have been coming to the market for so many years and it’s terrible that the market always has filthy, stinking and open gutters, an eerie stench daily, and stray animals running around with bits of garbage which aids in the spread of the said garbage in the area. The municipality needs to take the onus for the filth in this market and create a system of collection,” explains senior citizen Pradaali Kamat who visits the market daily for fresh vegetables.
Municipal worker Raju Gaonkar in his khaki clad uniform stationed at the municipal market, sitting beside a mobile shop that sells Chinese headsets and playing matka with over 15 bookies in the market explains, “In the Gandhi market area, there are also some homes and a few slums. Door to door garbage collection happens in these residences. In the market section, my job is to just collect the garbage and throw it at this one point. From there, it’s the onus of the MMC trucks to come and collect the garbage and not my lookout. It’s not possible to keep a bin with each vendor and take their garbage,” asserted Raju.
Meanwhile, former MMC Chief Officer Siddhivinayak Naik stated that it’s not his fault nor does the onus lie on him to maintain a clean market. “There is a hierarchy in place and the sanitation department should do their job. Hence, neither I nor the municipality as a whole can be blamed for this menace. The councilor of the ward is to be completely blamed for the failure to maintain cleanliness and hygiene in the market area,” stated Naik.
