Citizens need to learn to keep their city clean: HC

The citizens of the national capital need to learn to keep their city clean, the Delhi High Court on Wednesday said while asking the civic bodies to fix a schedule for collection and disposal of garbage.

"The citizens of the national capital should also have some responsibility. They should also learn about keeping their city clean," a bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice C Hari Shankar observed.

It said the residents should know how to store the garbage till the scheduled time for depositing it at the designated area.

"In foreign countries, the garbage vans come once a week. There the residents are patient enough to hold back the garbage," it said, adding that the issue of garbage disposal and collection should be taken care of on "war footing".

It asked all the three municipal corporations to start a pilot project of collecting and depositing of garbage as per a fixed time schedule.

"If the time is fixed, the people will also have to abide by it," the bench remarked and said "we want to see that the citizens, who are the sufferers, also learn about keeping their own city clean".

It had earlier issued directions regarding creation of public awareness regarding collection and disposal of waste, saying no long-term plan for making and keeping the city clean would work without the participation of the citizens.

The bench also suggested that the people violating the norms should be challaned.

This was suggested by the bench, which has been regularly monitoring the issue of garbage removal and disposal from the city after it was told that lack of cleanliness also leads to spread of vector-borne diseases like dengue, chikungunya and malaria.

The issue of garbage cropped up during the hearing of two PILs by lawyers Arpit Bhargava and Gauri Grover who have sought directions to the municipal bodies and other authorities to take steps to prevent spread of vector borne diseases like dengue, chikungunya and malaria.