After inquiry, Ghaziabad garbage unit to be updated, says civic body

The Ghaziabad municipal corporation’s additional municipal commissioner submitted a report after completing the inquiry into handling daily solid waste at the waste management unit or “garbage factory” at Ret Mandi on Thursday. Municipal commissioner Nitin Gaur ordered the inquiry after city mayor Sunita Dayal visited the unit on Tuesday and found several irregularities in handling daily solid waste.

“The inquiry has been completed, and it has revealed that the old vendor performing manual solid waste segregation at the site has left. A new vendor has been recently assigned the job, and they are constructing a plant to separate the dry and wet waste. The setup will take about two more weeks to complete. We will also direct all workers at the site to wear protective gloves and face masks. Other issues raised by the mayor will be addressed as well,” said Gaur.

“The wet waste will be converted to manure, while the recyclable dry waste will be removed from the unit’s new plant. The non-recyclable dry waste will be sent to our processing site in Morta, where another vendor will acquire it for use in road construction or other activities,” Gaur added.

The unit’s full operations will resume in two weeks, said civic officials with knowledge of the matter.

The waste management unit at Ret Mandi opened in 2022 and handles approximately 250-300 metric tonnes of solid waste per day generated by the corporation’s city zone. The city’s other waste management unit in Sihani processes daily waste from the Kavi Nagar zone.

On Tuesday, the mayor inspected the site and declared it a “dumping ground” rather than a waste processing facility. She also said that the workers at the site were not wearing protective gear such as masks or gloves and that a playschool for their children was closed.

The civic body set up the two units to handle daily solid waste because the city currently has no facility to scientifically process the 1,400 metric tonnes of solid waste it generates daily.

There has been a proposal to build a waste-to-energy plant in Galand with a processing capacity of 2,300 metric tonnes of waste per day for the past several years. Still, no construction has begun due to residents’ opposition.

The proposed plant will likely handle waste from the Ghaziabad municipal corporation area, Hapur district, and Dasna and Khoda towns.