the goan I network
MARGAO
Perhaps for the first time after the city was hit by a waste crisis, the South Goa District Administration intervened on Thursday to bring both the Margao Municipal Council and Fomento official for a discussion to resolve all issues at the earliest.
Upon instructions from Deputy Chief Minister Vijai Sardesai, district Collector, South Prasanna Acharya spoke to the top management of Fomento and obtained the nod to continue the operation well beyond 6 pm to cart away the waste rejects stacked inside the waste treatment plant.
Briefing the media, Acharya said the Fomento management was kind enough to allow the MMC to continue the carting away of rejects operation well beyond 6 pm. “This will allow the MMC to work till midnight inside the plant to cart away the waste. If the plan goes as planned, waste rejects inside the plant estimated around 700 tons will be out of the plant within the next two days, beginning from today,” he said.
Replying to a question, Acharya said he spoke to Fomento top management and impressed upon them that the issue needs to be looked at from a humanitarian angle with waste collection in the city going haywire and a stink staring at the city.
The district Collector, who also visited the dump site to gather a factual position at the site, stressed on building trust between the MMC and the Concessionaire. “After going through reports, it appears there’s trust between the two sides,” he added.
Acharya further said that he has had discussions with MMC Chief Officer Sidhivinayak Naik, who insisted that it will take some more days to lift away the rejects if Fomento does not allow the civic body to cart away the waste beyond 6 pm.
He, however, made it clear that the intervention of the district authorities is purely restricted to the problems faced by the civic body to cart away the waste from the Sonsodo plant and the stink raised in the city over waste disposal. “All questions relating to waste segregation and how long will the civic body continue dumping the waste on the existing dump falls within the domain of the MMC,” he added.
To another question, he said the MMC chief officer has promised to clear all the black spots in the city from the waste mounds by Friday evening.
