MARGAO
The Shadow Council for Margao has upped the ante against the dumping of waste for land-filling near the district Court building by knocking on the doors of the Goa State Pollution Control Board, demanding the testing of the “inert” waste dumped by the Margao Municipal Council/ Goa Waste Management Corporation at the site.
A delegation of SCM led by convenor Savio Coutinho on Thursday called on GSPCB Member Secretary Dr Shamila Monteiro to remind the body of the indiscriminate dumping of screened mixed garbage near the district court building, which is claimed to be “inert” waste from the bio-remediation work going on at Sonsodo.
“The citizens here are facing immense hardships due to the foul smell from this waste, which can be experienced around a kilometre of radius. We had expected the GSPCB to examine and verify the possibility of irreversible damage due to the dumping of the pollutants in the guise of “inert” material,” the memorandum stated.
The SCM delegation handed over the samples of so-called inert waste to the GSPCB Member Secretary for conducting the tests to ascertain the composition of the waste since no such tests or examinations have been carried out by the Pollution Control Board.
After handing over the three samples of waste to the GSPCB Member Secretary, the delegation demanded an investigation of the composition of the waste samples with respect to odour, the pH value of the sample, COD, BOD, presence of Arsenic and Heavy metals by using an ICP, Polynuclear Aromatic Hydrocarbons, Organic peroxides and other hazardous materials present.
Alternatively, the delegation demanded that the GSPCB may collect the samples from the site in their presence, and conduct the tests for the presence of the hazardous materials.
