Margao Municipal Council is yet to set in place a proper and effective mechanism to deal with the garbage generated in the town. And while the garbage management plant continues to be in doldrums at Sonsoddo, what is shocking is that practically every corner of the town is turning into a dump yard.
The door to door garbage collection launched by the council is pathetic to say the least as the labourers mix all types of waste thereby negating the whole principle of waste segregation. The council was supposed to privatise garbage collection, but that is in a state of limbo as the Directorate of Municipal Administration is yet to decide which of the two parties that bid for the contract should get the job.
From November the MMC launched a segregated waste collection project in ward Nos. 2 to 7 which has not really worked as people continue to give mixed garbage and nobody has taken up the task of educating the people on how to segregate the waste and give segregated waste.
Sanitary staff complain that whenever they go to the apartments the owners are not present as they are working and at many places the maid does not even open the door and permit them to talk to them.
Bapu Environmental Social Service Organisation, that was given the task of collecting the segregated garbage in the six wards of Fatorda, has also earned ire of the people as it provided only 30 labourers as against the agreement to provide 45 workers.
While the staff of Bapu Environmental Social Service Organisation are paid Rs 500 per day, the other municipal workers collecting garbage from households in the other wards were paid only Rs. 325 per day prompting them to resort to a flash strike recently following which even their wages have now been raised to Rs 500 per day.
In fact the sanitary section had asked for 250 labourers to collect the garbage from the whole municipal areas but had to do with only 96 and now the 22 labourers dislodged from the six wards of Fatorda are used in other areas.
While admitting that the MMC has not succeeded in dealing with the garbage menace as yet, MMC Vice Chairperson Tito Cardoso was hopeful of the situation changing in the next year. “We are holding a meeting of the sanitation committee in January to fine tune our garbage management,” he said.
Incidentally, while the MMC is yet to deal with the garbage that is collected every day, the huge mounds of garbage dumped at Sonsoddo over the years continues to be a health hazard as nothing appears to be done about it except the remedial segregation that was done for about a month before the onset of the monsoons.
