The landfill in Mitaganahalli.
Credit: DH FILE PHOTO
Bengaluru: The Bengaluru Solid Waste Management Ltd (BSWML), established to manage the city’s 6,000 tonnes of daily waste, is facing criticism from the Kannur gram panchayat for improper waste disposal at the Mitaganahalli landfill.
The panchayat has urged senior officials to visit the site for a firsthand assessment.
In a letter to Chief Secretary Shalini Rajneesh, panchayat president Ashok S has said that Bengaluru’s municipal corporation has been dumping waste on gomala land for the past nine years.
"The landfill receives all types of waste, including medical, animal, and industrial waste, without any processing. Recently, a decomposed woman’s body was discovered there, yet authorities in Bengaluru ignore our calls,” he stated.
He also warned of severe environmental damage, citing leachate contamination in open quarries that has spread to nearby lakes, including Bellalli, Kannur, Chikkagubbi, Doddagubbi, and Rampura. The letter included images of dead fish in polluted water bodies and dead cows near the landfill.
On Tuesday, around 500 garbage compactors were unable to unload waste at the site where the decomposed body was found. This may disrupt the city’s door-to-door garbage collection on Wednesday.
Following the complaint, BSWML officials visited the site, located 25 km from Bengaluru’s city centre, to assess the situation.
However, this is not the first time that locals and elected representatives, including former MLA Aravind Limbavalli, have objected to the Mitaganahalli landfill’s operation. Despite multiple attempts by the civic body to find alternative waste disposal sites, local opposition has stalled progress.