PINAKI MAJUMDAR
Jamshedpur, Aug 16: Garbages and other wastes littered in a haphazard manner along major thoroughfares in several places of the steel city is a common sight these days.
Except for the posh Circuit House Area and Bistupur, the city’s main commercial centre, one can easily come across the menace of garbages.
Be it Sakchi, Baridih, Sonari or Mango residents have one common complaint–inefficiency of civic bodies like Jamshedpur Notified Area Committee ( JNAC) and Mango Notified Area Committee ( MNAC ) in resolving the issue.
Civic body authorities admitted the problem and said that it was because of an absence of a permanent place for disposal of waste.
Notably, the ambitious solid waste treatment plant at Khairbani in the outskirts of steel city has failed to come up because of protests by local people and other political reasons.
The project was already stalled since 2013 for the same reasons.
The Jamshedpur Notified Area Committee has been making attempts to get the ambitious project executed but facing strong resistance from the local residents who think once the project gets through in their locality, the environment will be polluted.
The executing agency of the project had raised the boundary wall at the project site, but had to stop work after the residents of Khairbani resorted to violent protest against the project a couple of years back.
” We want the ambitious project to get through as it will take care of the city’s garbage-related problems, ” said a JNAC official.
It had been envisaged that solid wastes accumulated from civic body areas in Jamshedpur, Mango and Jugsalai would be treated at the Khairbani plant, about 15 kms away from the heart of the city, thus getting rid of the municipal garbage of the steel city.
Residents of Mango, Jugsalai and other places are extremely worried about the threat to sanitation especially at a time the Covid-19 pandemic was prevailing.
The steel city generates over 400 tons of waste daily (comprising both company and non-company command areas).
Wastes are usually disposed of at the Bara landfill site in Sidhgora. In Jusco command areas, organic waste is treated in the compost plant inside the Jubilee Park.
The Rs 250-crore waste management project has been granted 34 acres. Of the total land, 30 acres belong to the state government while four acres is raiyati land.
