Hotels in Bangalore are often blamed for dumping waste in public places. But there are some City hotels which follow the best practices to handle the refuse. Of course, they do spend extra for their new zeal for cleanliness.
   Deccan Herald spoke to owners of a few hotels who have been disposing of leftovers systematically with the help of private contractors designated by BBMP.
   Meet A S Bhat, manager of Hotel Brindavan on MG Road for the past 35 years. “Our hotel was set up in 1967. For years there was no proper mechanism for municipal waste disposal. A dust-bin placed close to Parade Ground on MG Road was used to dump all types of garbage. It was a nuisance. However, the bin has now been removed,” he says. “We spend nearly Rs 4,000 a month to dispose of ga-rbage. We store all perishable waste generated in a day in separate bags and the truck takes them away at 7 am. As for plastic bottles, our workers earn a little money selling them to recycling units,” he adds.
   Halli Mane, a hotel known for its desi food items at Malleswaram and Nisarga Garden on Infantry Road, have adopted similar practices. Says Neelavara Sanjeeva Rao, its owner,“ We’ve made arrangements with private contractors to take away the waste every morning. We spend nearly Rs 3,000 a month on this.”
   At Nisarga Garden, manager Rajeev Shetty says “Our first priority is to keep the place clean”. His hotel spends Rs 1,000 a month on the same. However. “I’m not aware where the garbage ultimately gets dumped and it isn’t my concern,” he adds.
   It not just these vegetarian restaurants that are on the cleanliness-first bandwagon. A majority of non-vegetarian eateries, big and small, now have a proper waste disposal system.
   The restaurants in Frazer Town and Shivajinagar areas now follow a proper disposal system. So do those on St John’s Church Road. “ About six to seven containers of waste is disposed of every day. Arrangements have been made with these contractors, who collect the waste twice a day for which they charge Rs 300 a week,” said Iqbal, Siddique Kabab Centre manager.
   The Empire restaurant at Shivajinagar also follows a similar procedure “in the interest of local residents.”
   It’s not as if the hotels/restaurants have turned hygiene-conscious overnight. Much of what they do now for waste disposal owe a lot to residents’ sustained pressure on civic authorities to impose hefty fines on restaurants that dump in open. “Even 10-5 da-ys back they were dumping waste in the open,”  Gunjeet Singh of Frazer Town says.