New delhi: The East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) commissioner has been summoned before the Legislative Assembly's environment committee in connection with a fire at the Ghazipur landfill site, chairperson of the panel said on Thursday.
The committee will hold its sitting on Friday in which the EDMC commissioner has been asked to appear. The committee will also visit the landfill site after its sitting, AAP MLA and Delhi Assembly's Environment Committee chairperson Atishi said in a statement.
The fire broke out at the garbage dump at Ghazipur on Wednesday due to which the air quality index and pollution levels went up and the entire East Delhi was filled with smoke, she said.
"The sitting has been called to know the reason behind the poor waste management of the EDMC, why the garbage continues to be dumped on the landfill site, and who is responsible for the fire that broke out at the site. Stringent actions must be taken against the authorities responsible for the fire," she said.
"The pollution levels in Delhi go up in October and November due to stubble burning in the neighbouring states, which leaves people in the city choking. The air quality of Delhi has improved in the last five-six days, mainly since the time the incidents of stubble burning have decreased in the neighbouring states," she claimed.
After the fire broke out on Wednesday, the AAP and BJP traded barbs with each other with the former accusing the latter of deliberately setting fire to garbage to increase pollution levels and "defame the Delhi government".
On Thursday, AAP MLA Saurabh Bhardwaj called for a "high-level investigation" and asked that the East MCD Commissioner be questioned, going on to say that L-G Anil Baijal should intervene in
the issue.
"Whenever the pollution situation worsens in Delhi the BJP instructs the MCD officials to put fire on the garbage to increase the pollution levels of Delhi. Yesterday Aam Aadmi Party MLA Shri Kuldeep Kumar exposed that the BJP has put fire on the Ghazipur landfill site. They know that the stubble burning time has gone and that is why to harass the people of Delhi the BJP is doing this kind of shameful act," Bhardwaj said.
Meanwhile, the Delhi Police have registered a case of negligence causing the fire at the landfill site, based on a complaint from a BJP councillor.
North MCD Mayor Jai Prakash said "the AAP has failed to control the coronavirus situation in Delhi and is now using this incident to divert public attention away from their own failures. For all we know, they might have started the fire themselves.