Garbage city

If the IT city of Bangalore has turned into a garbage city, it has no one to blame but its totally indifferent rulers.

The state government, headed by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and the civic body, the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagar Palike (BBMP), have exhibited utter lack of seriousness in resolving the issue.

The trash is dumped everywhere on the streets, an eyesore to anyone.

In village Mandur, which has turned into a dumping yard, the issue has grown into Himalayan proportions with residents opposing any more dumping but an uncaring administration is clueless how to solve it.

It was around this time last year when the residents, who were holding demonstrations against the dumping in their vicinity, agreed to give one year to the BBMP on the assurance that the latter would stop dumping garbage in Mandur.

Around the same time, on May 12, 2013, the day he assumed office as chief minister, Siddaramaiah declared that his government would find a permanent solution to garbage menace in six months.

Forget six months, now, over a year later, his lackadaisical government has not moved an inch. What was he doing for the last one year?

Did he not find time to address the problem? Rather, he has now sought another six months.

Last week, the outraged villagers of Mandur had come all the way to the city to meet Siddaramaiah but he had little time for them, leaving the meeting midway.

Ever since the BBMP started dumping the waste, the residents of the village have been reporting sick and last week, there were two deaths which were attributed to diseases arising out of the untreated waste.

Leachate - liquid coming out of garbage dump – has seeped into the adjoining fields making the crops and vegetables grown there unhygienic to eat.

Instead of being sensitive to their cause, the Siddaramaiah government has attempted to browbeat them by imposing prohibitory orders under Section 144 on the village.

At Mandur, the BBMP unloads most of the 4000 tonne of garbage produced in Bangalore daily. Ideally, garbage should be treated locally and made into compost/manure but in Bangalore this goes straight to landfills.

In a report submitted to the Karnataka High Court, an expert committee constituted by it said neither has a proposed waste-to-energy plant been set up as promised, nor is the waste being processed scientifically at Mandur.

At least now, the government should move, understand the seriousness, and make concerted efforts to resolve the problem.