While civic bodies claim that they are fogging and cleaning drains regularly across Delhi, residents of some of the most disease-prone areas say otherwise.
“Weeks pass by without any fogging by the MCD during summer and monsoon. Despite complaints to the area councillor and MCD cleaners we see in our localities no action is taken. From newspapers and channels we get to know that lakhs have been allotted to civic agencies for cleaning localities and keeping them garbage-free as well. Are they doing their job? I don’t think so,” says Pradeep Kumar, an advocate and resident from Narela in north west Delhi.
Narela is among the most dengue and malaria-prone areas in Delh. Other vulnerable areas include Najafgarh, located on the outskirts of south west Delhi, and Shahdara in north east Delhi.
Najafgarh resident Sudeep Singh says he has complained to the MCD several times and even written letters regarding overflowing drains.
“The drains are not cleaned regularly because of which the waste water from our house does not flow into them, and spreads all over the road,” he says “This leaves a bad stench and invites many diseases.”
Singh adds that several residents from the area have requested the civic agencies to take necessary action, but nothing has been done.
“When we tried to enquire from the cleaners why they come only once in two weeks or even once a month, they said they cannot come every day. If we want to keep the society clean, we will have to give them extra money.”
The story is no different where Chandrashekhar Sharma lives in Shahdara. "We try to call cleaners who work independently so that our area remains clean. But when we have the MCD paying their cleaners, this shouldn’t be needed,” he says.
But MCD cleaners don’t do their job and instead get into arguments with the residents, he says. Children from the locality fall ill frequently.
Even residents of Dwarka demand that the government should run operations such as fumigation and cleaning of water bodies and drains to stop mosquito breeding. “There are so many mosquitoes in the JJ colony in Sector 16 A near Dwarka Metro station that we fear getting malaria and dengue,” says local resident Sheonath Sharma.
The rains over the past few weeks have triggered a spurt in vector-borne diseases in Delhi with government figures indicating that malaria cases have sharply increased compared to last year, the largest numbers being reported are from North Delhi Municipal Corporation areas.
The worst-affected are the slums, jhuggi jhopri clusters and camps for homeless where people have to clean the area on their own as corporation cleaners shun these localities.