Amit Pokre
The next big move of the Modi government in the nation’s mission to clean up after the much-celebrated but not enough ‘Swacch Bharat’ campaign is knocking on our doors with a complete ban on single-use plastic which the Centre is determined to launch on Gandhi Jayanti.
But experts aren’t all gung-ho over the initiative and the one dampener they unanimously cite is the country’s inability to adequately and efficiently recycle the plastic waste.
In fact, there’s scant attention or intervention of the government in this crucial aspect of the fight against the impact on the environment caused by the colossal non-biodegradable waste churned out by the indiscriminate use of plastic in day-to-day life.
The story of the plastic problem is no different in Goa, which besides the lack of concern from its estimated 1.5 million resident population, has to also contend with the indifference of an equal if not more number of tourists that flock here every year.
But amid the dark clouds of piling plastic waste which has thrown up eye-sores along highways, in its cities and even several of its fast urbanizing villages, Goa is lucky to have a silver lining in a fairly significant number of people who live in the margins of society and are often ostracized, but who play a quiet but welcome role of helping the State rid itself of a large amount of plastic waste - rag pickers mostly from the run-down Lamani community.
Mostly after dusk and before dawn, in twos and threes, armies of these rag pickers roam the streets in Goa’s cities and villages picking up plastic and selling the segregated items on a daily basis to contractors who mostly operate from scrapyards.
The contractors then make bales of this recyclable plastic load them in trucks en-route to factories outside the State in Mumbai and other industrial hubs across the border to be processed into recycled plastic utility articles which make their way back to the markets.
This chain of recycling plastic waste, according to rough estimates, earns livelihoods for up to 5000 people, according to one contractor who operates from a scrapyard in Mapusa’s Karaswada area.
“We send this plastic waste by packing it in gunny bags to Mumbai. We really don’t know what happens to it after that,” Zaffar the scrapyard operator in Karaswada, Mapusa said.
According to him, there are around 10 scrapyards in Karaswada alone and around 200 people attached to each.
“Dho-theen hajar logonki roji roti iss dhande se chalti hai sahab,” said Zaffar (around 2-3000 people earn their living from this business sir).
And almost all the labour involved are migrants.
According to Zaffar and one of his workmates, the quantum of bottles is significantly higher than carry bags in the piles of waste collected thus. And the quantum of plastic disposed is much bigger than all of the dry waste collection operated door-to-door by civic bodies and panchayats in Goa, he added.
In Panjim city, most of these rag-pickers collect waste from offices and shops around Azad Maidan Panaji municipal market, 18th June road and other business and commercial locales.
“We collect plastic bottles, cardboards and other stuff. We sell it to a contractor with whom we have a long-term regular deal, and get between Rs 8-12 per kg,” said Laxmi Pittu for whom rag-picking is the only source of income.
“I make about Rs 300 a day and up to 500 on a good day selling the plastic waste to the contractor. My entire family is involved in the activity,” ragpicker Pittu added.
What’s also significant is that this entire plastic re-cycling chain is self-sustaining and not a single rupee from the State exchequer gets pumped in.
