MAPUSA
It’s an open secret now.
Collecting garden waste dumped by the roadside or in open places has become a headache for the Mapusa municipality.
For months now, garden waste was seen piling up by the roadside as the civic body was found struggling to clear the waste.
With civic workers failing to lift the waste locals began to set it on fire thus polluting the air.
The Mapusa Municipal Council (MMC) is also contemplating taxing the residents for lifting garden waste dumped in the open.
There is near unanimity among the councillors that the garbage tax of Rs 750 per annum was not enough to tackle the garbage collection in town.
At the council meeting last week, councillor Ashirwad Khorjuvenkar said that people dumping garden waste in the open should be either fined or the council should charge people for the collection of garden waste.
“The garbage tax of Rs 750 is for door-to-door waste collection service. People should be asked to pay up for the collection of garden waste,” Khorjuvenkar said.
Ironically, there were no complaints about the collection of garden waste in the past. The municipal vehicles used to visit every ward once a week and collect the waste on time.
Councillor of ward 5, Shashank Narvekar informed that he had informed the residents in his ward to dump their garden waste every Friday and would ensure that the municipality vehicle lifts the waste on that day.
He said there was no such problem with collecting garden waste in his ward.
“We need to manage the waste collection properly. We also need to inform the residents about systems put in place,” Narvekar said.
Sources in the municipality informed that vehicles to collect waste were not available with the municipality and therefore, there were complaints of piling up of waste in the open.
The vehicles had either broken down or were sent to the garages for repair.
When councillor or ward 20 Prakash Bhivshet demanded to know the number of trucks available to collect waste with the municipality, the officials were unable to give a straight reply.
“We have got a new mini-truck for waste collection which is in the process of getting registered. We are also supposed to get another vehicle soon,” said MMC’s Municipal Engineer, Prashant Narvekar.
