Residents on five roads between Cubbon Road and Infantry Road in Bengaluru Central are on a single-minded mission to make their ward completely garbage free.
Coming under Sampangiramnagar ward, the residents have initiated the 'two bins one bag system' of disposing garbage on a pilot basis in certain areas of the ward.
They have also taken a number of other steps to accomplish their mission.
"We started the pilot project in January soon after the Karnataka High Court’s directive in January making it mandatory for residents to collect and dispose of garbage using the “two bins, one bag” concept. As part of the pilot, we gave as many as 200 sets of two bins and a bag to residents of around five roads. The pilot was a grand success and we are now going to include more areas," said M S Sufiyan, secretary, Active Residents Welfare Association.
The five areas where the pilot was initiated are Plain Street, Union Street, Bowring Hospital Road, Infantry Road and Cubbon Road. Residents of these five areas make up the Active Residents Welfare Association.
Sufiyan said that since the new system of garbage collection and disposal was implemented, residents have seen a significant decrease in their garbage: "There was 100% segregation of waste during the pilot. We measured the amount of garbage generated in each household and this was approximately around 600 grams a day. Through the segregation there was a 15% reduction in garbage. The immediate aim is to make it 30%," he added.
In the coming weeks, roads like Ali Asker Road, Cunningham Road, OPS Road and Dispensary Road with around 560 households have been identified for expansion.
The entire ward that falls under Shivajinagar constituency, has close to 33,000 residents. Taking into account residents of the five roads that were part of the pilot and the four other roads being included, the project will touch around 8,000 residents, according to Sufiyan. “It will take at least another six to eight months to integrate the entire ward but we are at it,” said Sufiyan.
Suman SM, secretary of the residents’ association of Krishna Apartments, Ali Asker Road, was recently at a workshop on waste management organised by ARWA.
“Although we have been segregating waste for a year now, we joined the “two bins, one bag fold” with other residents recently. This has helped a lot and hopefully more people in the locality will adopt this concept.”
DH News Service
Use of social media
The residents of the ward are very active on Whatsapp and Facebook. They recently made a video on waste segregation that has been shared through such platforms. A workshop on waste segregation, where an expert was asked to speak to residents, was also organised. An orientation in waste handling for 35 pourakarmikas who operate in and around the area, is also on the anvil.
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