All wards of KMC to get waste segregation at source

Kolkata: The Solid Waste Management (SWM) department of Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) will introduce segregation of waste at source phase-wise in all 144 wards in the city.

The civic body on Wednesday introduced segregation at source in 20 wards in the city, with Mayor Firhad Hakim's ward 82 at Chetla being one of them.

"The biggest challenge of urbanisation is to have a scientific system of solid waste management, for which segregation at source is of major importance. We have been doing segregation at source in seven wards in the city for a long time. Today, we have introduced it in 20 wards. We will be taking up 20 wards every three months and in phases we will introduce similar facilities in all 144 wards in the KMC," the Mayor said at a programme in ward 82 organised by the SWM department. The programme commemorated the occasion where two separate bins were handed over to every family - one for dumping biodegradable waste and another for non-biodegradable wastes. Each household in these 20 wards will be given two buckets - white and green in colour. Discarded items made of paper, rubber, plastic, glass, wood, iron and different other metal products should be kept in the white one, while cooked or uncooked food, fish scales, egg shells, vegetable waste, parts of flowers or fruits should be disposed off in the green one.

"The green one will be collected on a daily basis, while the white one will be collected every alternate day. The segregation of wastes that can be recycled will be done by KMC at Dhapa landfill site," said Debabrata Majumder, Member, Mayor-in-Council (SWM).

The KMC has already introduced a number of auto trippers in the city, for collection of non-biodegradable wastes. Hakim sought the assistance of the residents of Kolkata for making the initiative successful. "Kolkata was the first city in the country which had introduced compactor stations that have gradually replaced almost all open vats in the city. We have introduced pollution-free battery operated vehicles in the city for collection of waste. We are in the process of procurement of more such vehicles and by the end of the financial year 2019-20. We will also be replacing all hand-pulled vehicles that are used for garbage disposal in the city," Majumder said.

He expressed his optimism that Kolkata is all poised to emerge as a model 'clean and green' city, achieving 100 percent segregation of waste at source in the next few years.