Waste Management | Citizen Matters

How a small Himalayan town panchayat is showing Shimla the way to effective waste management

October 22, 2019 Ashwani Sharma

Aima panchayat, an urban-rural agglomeration near Palampur, has its own modern garbage treatment park, with the facility to handle all kinds of waste, including plastic. Inspired by it, Shimla has now set up its own waste-to-energy plant, expected to help the capital in sustainable waste management.

As Kolkata begins Durga Puja festivities on Mahalaya, environment gets a raw deal

September 28, 2019 Mou Chakraborty

2500 plus community pujas. Lakhs of revellers. The Durga Puja celebrations in Kolkata are magical, but harsh and unforgiving on the environment. Unfortunately, thoughts and plans on greening the celebrations appear to be at a very immature stage still.

Guwahati’s garbage mess gets worse in the rains, calls for collective action

August 24, 2019 Hriday Ch Sarma

Monsoon has turned the streets of Guwahati into a serious health hazard for citizens, and this is why. Most importantly, the solution now lies as much in the hands of citizens as with city administrators.

Hope anew for Delhi’s Ghazipur landfill as PMO steps in

August 8, 2019 Sri Krishna

Following national and international outcry over East Delhi’s towering Ghazipur dump, the Prime Minister’s Office has issued a Global Request for Proposal (RFP) inviting solutions from experts to the problems posed by the landfill.

How one of Delhi’s tallest structures is contributing to climate change

July 17, 2019 Sri Krishna

Intense summers are not uncommon in Delhi, but when temperatures soared to 48 degrees this June, it was a record even by city standards. Could emissions from the East Delhi Ghazipur landfill have had a role to play?

Will NGT crackdown force Lucknow civic body to sort out its waste mess?

July 4, 2019 Atul Chandra

An NGT-appointed committee has recommended fines of Rs 5 crore and Rs 2 crore respectively on the Lucknow Municipal Corporation and its chosen private partner in solid waste management, Eco Green. Here’s why.

Inside Dehradun’s Bindal slum, where the city’s waste pickers live

June 11, 2019 Rishabh Shrivastava

Despite the crucial role they play in the city, efforts to improve the living conditions of Dehradun’s waste pickers — mostly migrants — have been minimal and they continue to live in unsafe conditions, with little or no assistance from the Municipal Corporation.

Waste mounds in open landfills grow higher as Kolkata brazenly ignores SWM rules

June 6, 2019 Gurvinder Singh

In Kolkata’s Dhapa and other neighbouring municipalities, open landfills lie filled to the brim with unsegregated waste. Biomedical waste disposal too does not uniformly conform to the rules formulated. A lax administration merely looks on and introduces token measures in select pockets.

Dumping waste right into Bhagirathi: What Uttarkashi’s garbage problem tells us

May 21, 2019 Rishabh Shrivastava

Uttarakhand generates approximately 1406 Tons of solid waste per day and none of this is getting treated. It is high time we address this huge challenge faced by cities and towns of Himalayan Uttarakhand.

Living in hell: Sewage, garbage and contaminated water leave 2800 families struggling in Delhi transit camp

May 13, 2019 Akshita Nagpal

Evicted Kathputli Colony residents struggle with water shortage and lack sanitation in their temporary homes in Anand Parbat. As they wait for the new homes, the sordid conditions in the transit space create grave implications for the environment.

What Bengaluru’s scientific waste management can teach the Swachh Bharat mission

May 6, 2019 Jude Weston

While the Government of India has time and again emphasised the importance of cleanliness, Bengaluru has kept up the spirit of swachhata with a number of initiatives. See how an innovative waste collection station, plastic tiles and a compost school are reimagining waste management in the city.

City Buzz : Fani hits Odisha and W Bengal | BMC’s plastic headache | Charminar suffers damage…and more

May 5, 2019 News Desk

Catch your weekly dose of some of the most important local news from cities across India.

Infrastructure and environment battle it out in the maximum city

April 28, 2019 Nikhil S Dixit

Several infrastructure projects are coming up in Mumbai, that could irrevocably damage the city’s coastline and green spaces. While environmentalists allege that projects were announced without public discussion and ignoring the environmental impact, political parties brush aside these concerns

People in this Mumbai slum barely make it to 40; here’s why

April 24, 2019 Apekshita Varshney

For decades, waste has been Mumbai’s teeming, unsolvable problem. Slums around the city’s dumping ground are now Asia’s largest, exposing ragpickers and the general population to serious health risks. All plans and commitments to waste management, meanwhile, appear figurative.

Why does our water ministry want a boat ride on Delhi’s largest sewer drain?

March 29, 2019 Sri Krishna

Union Minister Nitin Gadkari has proposed a Rs 12000-cr project for a water route from Delhi to Agra to Prayagraj, along the river Yamuna. But what will it do for the river, which has been reduced to a dumping ground for untreated sewage and industrial waste?