Bengaluru yet to figure out a world class garbage disposal system

The IT city which generates about 6,000 metric tonnes of solid municipal waste every day does not have a decentralised sustainable waste management system in place

waste-pickers-garbage-latest (File) Representational image

Bengaluru’s garbage disposal system is once again under the scanner. This time, the contractor-officer nexus in the Gandhinagar assembly constituency represented by Health Minister Dinesh Gundu Rao, has allegedly led to siphoning off of Rs 2.5 crore every month through fake bills.

The chief commissioner of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) ordered an inquiry into the charges of misappropriation by special commissioner Suralkar Vikas Kishore and sought the report within a week.

Former corporator and BJP leader N.R. Ramesh, who filed a complaint against the contractors (relatives of BBMP employees) before the Karnataka Lokayukta police and the BBMP chief commissioner, sought the cancellation of illegal work orders and stringent legal action against the erring contractors.

The contractors have been illegally raising huge bills over the last three to four years and senior BBMP officers have been clearing the payments without any scrutiny, causing loss to the exchequer. In violation of the tender norms, Krishna, a junior health inspector, his wife Sunita E.K., his brother-in-law Chandrashekhar E.K., a first division clerk Lokeshwari, her husband Ramachandra, father-in-law Muniyappa, sister-in-law Varalakshmi, another employee Narayan and his wife have bagged the work orders through fraudulent means and got the payments cleared through forgery, stated the complaint.

“Bengaluru has 198 civic wards across the 27 assembly constituencies that are within the BBMP limits. In 191 wards, the garbage collection and disposal in a single (morning) shift costs only Rs 15 lakh per ward, but the seven wards in Gandhinagara are charging Rs 35 lakh per ward by fraudulently showing work orders for three shifts, which is against the rule. Also, the contractors are the ‘benami’ of the BBMP employees as they are the blood relatives. This is also a violation of the BBMP tender rules,” said Ramesh, adding that the contractors were looting the BBMP with fake bills over the last 3-4 years.

The IT city that generates nearly 6,000 metric tonnes of solid municipal waste every day does not have a decentralised sustainable waste management system in place. The garbage mafia is so powerful that the tenders are floated only to favour a few and is pushing the global city to rely on a redundant and centralised system that breeds corruption and lacks accountability, rue civic activists.

In 2014-15, the BBMP invested Rs 450 crore to set up seven waste-processing plants at Seegehalli, Kannahalli, Doddabidarakallu, Lingadheeranahalli, Subbarayanapalya, KCDC Kudlu and Chikkanagamangala, hoping to process 2,000 tonnes of waste every day.

However, as the units could not process even 50 per cent of the volume, the unprocessed waste was being sent to the four landfills. But now, all seven units are defunct and the landfills are being opposed by the locals.

To make matters worse, the contractors do not ply enough auto-tippers to cut the high fuel cost. Less than half of all registered auto-tippers meant for door-to-door collection of garbage and dumping at compactors are ‘missing’ and those that are plying fail to mark their attendance on the auto-tipper registration (ATR) system.

“The auto-tippers do not have GPS or the Radio Frequency Identity (RFID) tags that are used to track the vehicles. The tippers have to mark their attendance twice – before and after work, which is to be authenticated by the assistant executive engineers (AEE). But none of these rules are being followed. There is no accountability, but unscrupulous elements are raising fake bills every month,” said Ramesh.

Last November, the Bengaluru Solid Waste Management Ltd (BSWML) proposed the opening of four new waste-processing plants, which was opposed by civic and environmental activists who urge the government to decentralise the process at the ward level to reduce garbage generation at source, effective segregation, eco-friendly composting and waste-to-energy plant initiatives to prevent corruption and meaningless transportation burden. 

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