The idea of launching a nation wide cleanliness and sanitation campaign is great. When we return back from our trips overseas, one question always pops up in mind - Why can't we have civic sense? Why can't we keep our streets, locality, town clean? A motivation coming from none other than the Prime Minister himself is more than welcome. A large part of incidence of communicable diseases in India can be attributed to lack of cleanliness and sanitation. Maintaining sanitation and keeping our surroundings clean is perhaps one of the cheapest methods of achieving good health in this country. The attention to this was long pending. Finally, it gets attention of the government and people, we are thankful to Mr. Modi for that.
But that is not enough. If this movement is to become a success, we will have to support the cause by passing some laws. Most of the municipalities in India are not in a position to give enough administrative support to make a dream of clean cities possible. Same is the case in villages. The Panchayat doesn't have resources enough to make it possible to have clean villages. Nirmal Gram Abhiyan is not so successful in real terms in most parts of the country. While there has been a drive to construct toilets in the villages, practical problems like availability of water, sewer connections and waste disposal systems in rural areas have not been discussed yet. Even if the toilets are constructed, they will remain unused.
Municipalities have a huge shortage of manpower. They do not have the capacity to carry the work forward. As per norms there have to be a 32 sanitation employees per 10000 persons but that is hardly maintained. The sanitation workers are infamous for their inefficiency to carry out the work properly, in almost all the cities in the country. They either do not report on job or they do not do the work. The result is - heaps of garbage in all corners of streets in our cities. Any piece of land which is vacant become a place to dump garbage. We have a right to throw away things anywhere on streets. There are no laws that can prevent us.
The problem is two fold. One, providing enough funds to the municipalities and panchayats to function effectively. Two, making laws that can empower the municipalities and panchayats and give them the strength to function effectively. Civic sense, comes as result of motivation. But it comes more quickly as a result of law.
Lack of proper Waste Management system is one of the biggest bottleneck in the success of the campaign. Waste is often dumped at shifting open dump sites in the cities creating an environmental problem. Open dumping is conducive to the generation and release of GHGs, such as methane – having 21 times more GHG potential than CO2. Our cities generate huge amount of waste a large part of which is organic waste. However, there are not enough compost plants in the cities. Source segregation and facilitating decentralized treatment where ever possible, is to be done in cities and for that government will have to construct compost plants and recycling plants.
Conventional approach to tackle the problem will not work. We have to think about innovative methods and techniques. A study conducted by IISC scientists showed that, it is possible to run
decentralized, ward-wise or smaller systems that are more sustainable (economically, environmentally and socially), and overcome some of the lacunae faced in the centralized systems. In the study they conclude decentralized systems of the future can provide greater sustainability but will require a higher level of waste generation and handling discipline.
PPP is a very glamorous word. Can we develop some PPPP, Public Private People's Parternership models at local levels in cities and villages to make the vision of Clean India possible? We have to think in that direction. If we can reach Mars through Mangalyaan, we can make this happen too.
But that is not enough. If this movement is to become a success, we will have to support the cause by passing some laws. Most of the municipalities in India are not in a position to give enough administrative support to make a dream of clean cities possible. Same is the case in villages. The Panchayat doesn't have resources enough to make it possible to have clean villages. Nirmal Gram Abhiyan is not so successful in real terms in most parts of the country. While there has been a drive to construct toilets in the villages, practical problems like availability of water, sewer connections and waste disposal systems in rural areas have not been discussed yet. Even if the toilets are constructed, they will remain unused.
Municipalities have a huge shortage of manpower. They do not have the capacity to carry the work forward. As per norms there have to be a 32 sanitation employees per 10000 persons but that is hardly maintained. The sanitation workers are infamous for their inefficiency to carry out the work properly, in almost all the cities in the country. They either do not report on job or they do not do the work. The result is - heaps of garbage in all corners of streets in our cities. Any piece of land which is vacant become a place to dump garbage. We have a right to throw away things anywhere on streets. There are no laws that can prevent us.
The problem is two fold. One, providing enough funds to the municipalities and panchayats to function effectively. Two, making laws that can empower the municipalities and panchayats and give them the strength to function effectively. Civic sense, comes as result of motivation. But it comes more quickly as a result of law.
Lack of proper Waste Management system is one of the biggest bottleneck in the success of the campaign. Waste is often dumped at shifting open dump sites in the cities creating an environmental problem. Open dumping is conducive to the generation and release of GHGs, such as methane – having 21 times more GHG potential than CO2. Our cities generate huge amount of waste a large part of which is organic waste. However, there are not enough compost plants in the cities. Source segregation and facilitating decentralized treatment where ever possible, is to be done in cities and for that government will have to construct compost plants and recycling plants.
Conventional approach to tackle the problem will not work. We have to think about innovative methods and techniques. A study conducted by IISC scientists showed that, it is possible to run
decentralized, ward-wise or smaller systems that are more sustainable (economically, environmentally and socially), and overcome some of the lacunae faced in the centralized systems. In the study they conclude decentralized systems of the future can provide greater sustainability but will require a higher level of waste generation and handling discipline.
PPP is a very glamorous word. Can we develop some PPPP, Public Private People's Parternership models at local levels in cities and villages to make the vision of Clean India possible? We have to think in that direction. If we can reach Mars through Mangalyaan, we can make this happen too.
We need to do it. No, we are liable to do it. Mr Modi!
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