Proposals for garbage disposal bites dust with the government

The State government’s apathy has been crippling Gram Panchayats in the district to proceed with the ambitious plan of disposal of solid waste at the source.

Though the proposal for sanctioning the solid waste management units in the Gram Panchayats have been sent for approval twice, there is hardly any response from the government.

The Zilla Panchayat have sent the proposal for solid waste management units in five Gram Panchayats to the government for the year 2012-13 under Nirmal Bharath Abhiyan. The same proposal has been again forwarded during 2013-14.

Zilla Panchayat Chief Executive Officer Kanagavalli told Deccan Herald that the proposal is under the consideration of the government.

A state-level high committee is formed to look into the proposals that are sent from across the state. “It is all at the government level. The proposal was sent last year.

However, a fresh proposal was sent on the same during the current year too. We have not yet received any approval from the government.

We expect the approval for the solid waste management units at the earliest,” she said.

Proposal

The proposal includes the solid waste management units at Kaup, Varmaballi, Navunda, 80-Badagabettu and Hebri.

The project ensures Rs 20 lakh to construct solid waste management units in particular Gram Panchayats.

The Gram Panchayat, which houses 500 and above houses are entitled for the provision. Besides, the financial assistance is provided to adopt scientific disposal of solid and liquid waste.

Problems galore

There are 146 Gram Panchayats in the district. Most of the Gram Panchayats do not own a systematic way of disposing the solid wastes.

In most of the Gram Panchayats, the garbage has been dumped on road sides or in nearby areas.

In some cases, a huge pond is formed in an interior area and garbage is dumped. There are some Gram Panchayats like 80-Badagabettu, Belapu, Hebri, Kantavara, Yedthare and Siddapura, which has gone a step further to initiate door-to-door garbage collection. However, the absence of an effective management of all the collected solid wastes has been a problem to these  Gram Panchayats.

The temporary disposal after the collection of solid waste has failed to offer a long-term solution.

Some of these Gram Panchayats have utilised the funds received under Nirmal Gram Puraskar and Suvarna Grama Yojane for the temporary solid waste management unit.

Another major problem encountered by the Gram Panchayats adjacent to national highway is the lack of suitable land to construct solid waste management unit.

Lack of land

Of the total 146 Gram Panchayats, as many as 107 GPs have received Nirmal Gram Purskar.

Nirmal Bharath Abhiyan Nodal Officer Uday Shetty said that plan has been chalked out to set up single solid waste management unit covering four to five gram panchayats adjoining national highway, owing to shortage of land for the disposal of wastes.

The scarcity of land to set up the unit has created problems. Some Gram Panchayats have sought land from the revenue department.

Once the land is identified,the process to construct solid waste units will be taken up, he added.