PMC garbage management marred by corruption, inefficiency
Civic officials admitted in Aug 2017 that their waste-to-biogas plants strategy has failed.
The United Nations Climate and Clean Air Award for Innovative Policy won by the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on September 11 at San Francisco (US) for innovative waste segregation model in partnership with Swach (solid waste collection and handling) is the latest in a string of awards won by the PMC.
.JPG "PMC garbage vehicles continue to dump mixed waste in the garbage ramp in Kothrud, which is later carried by trucks to Uruli Devachi and Phursungi landfill sites.(Sanket Wankhade/HT PHOTO)")
The fact, however, is that the PMC was indicted last year by Competition Commission of India (CCI) for a bid-rigging scam involving the solid waste management department of PMC.
At least 12-14 waste-to-energy plants have gone defunct, while the Uruli Devachi village is suffering from air and water pollution due to PMC landfills.
Besides, as exposed by HT, the PMC waste segregation model suffers from serious deficiencies due to the mixing of segregated and un-segregated garbage which is transported to the landfills.
In May, 2018, the CCI had imposed a fine of Rs 3.57 crore on six firms for colluding with PMC officials and undertaking bid rigging while filing tenders for thermal composting garbage plants in 2014. The nexus between PMC officials and contractors for rigging the bids was exposed by Hindustan Times in a series of reports in October 2017. The CCI conducted an enquiry on the basis of a complaint from Nagrik Chetna Manch, an NGO of alert citizen-activists.
The tenders pertained to seven thermal composting plants at various locations, including Kharadi, Ghole Patil road and Peshwe park, and were worth Rs 14 crore. The CCI has also indicted the PMC for failing to detect cartelisation in its own tenders.
In August 2017, the PMC officials admitted to HT that, after having embarked on an ambitious strategy to increase the processing of kitchen waste or wet garbage through waste-to-biogas plants in various localities of the city, the strategy has failed.
The civic body had spent more than Rs 16 crore in installing 25 plants in various localities of the city, and an additional Rs 1.5 crore towards annual maintenance, besides operational costs per plant. However, it was found that these plants were not working to their installed capacity and five plants were out of order.
The PMC’s 1,000 metric tonne per day capacity garbage-to-compost plant at Uruli Devachi garbage depot in association with Hanjar Enterprises has been completely shut down.
Commenting on the latest civic award, Chetan Tupe, leader of opposition in PMC, said that while the waste segregation model has been well designed, the implementation is extremely weak.
“The garbage containers are always full and are not being lifted regularly. The city faces the menace of stray cattle feeding on heaps of garbage and the garbage processing plants are not working. We, therefore, wonder how the PMC is getting such awards,” he said.
Tupe pointed out that the frustrated villagers at the landfill sites of Uruli Devachi and Phursungi regularly protest by blocking PMC garbage vehicles from entering their villages as the landfill poses a health risk to them.
Senior Congressman Arvind Shinde said that Pune’s garbage problem has remained unresolved and awards presented to PMC for solid waste management are misleading.
Awards won by PMC for its solid waste management projects
- HUDCO awards for best practices to ‘Improve the living environment 2012-13.
- APTDC award 2013: Runner-up for Swach model and PMC best practices.
- ICON SWM 2012 and 2014 awards of excellence in solid waste management (SWM) by International Society of Waste Management, Jadavpur University and Karnataka government.