Stop sending waste to landfills from Nov 1: NGT to Bengaluru municipal body

The NGT also insisted on stricter enforcement of single-use plastics from September 1.

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The National Green Tribunal committee on state-level monitoring of waste management has given the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) a deadline of November 1 to stop sending waste to landfills.

“Since all the available landfill sites are filled to the brim, we have no option but to make sure that the wet waste is sorted at ward and community levels. Bulk generators such as defence and police establishments, apartments, etc must compost wet waste. It’s the job of corporators and ward committees to ensure this,” said Justice (retd) Subhash Adi, the Chairman of the National Green Tribunal State Level Monitoring Committee for Solid Waste Management, Karnataka.

“By November 1 (Kannada Rajyotsava), the BBMP should set ensure that no waste enters any landfill site. I am sure this deadline can be met as officials are working hard on it,” he added.

Subhash Adi was addressing city corporators at the special BBMP council meet on the lacunae in solid waste management.

While the Mayor had issued a circular all 198 corporators to attend the session, only 100 attended and even a majority of them left the address halfway, reported The New Indian Express.

The Hindu quoted the Mayor stating that tender for wet waste collection would be issued by September-end, and hence they want a deadline extension.

“Since the fresh tender is yet to be finalised, we would need more time to implement what the NGT says,” Mayor Gangambike Mallikarjun said.

Other than this, the NGT committee chief insisted on stricter enforcement of single-use plastics from September 1.

Other than the NGT, Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa also had recently pulled up the BBMP for improper management of garbage and held a meeting with BBMP Commissioner Manjunath Prasad soon after taking oath as CM for the fourth time.

According to BBMP estimates, 45% of the city’s unsegregated waste directly goes to landfills. To mitigate the problem, the BBMP officials had proposed a system of collecting only wet waste collection by contractors and dry waste collection by independent waste pickers following national SWM guidelines.

However, that plan has been facing opposition from the Mayoral committee since May.

Read: No separate tender for dry and wet waste? Disagreement brews in Bengaluru civic body