Beginning Wednesday, handing over mixed waste to pourakarmikas because you find segregation too complicated is going to cut no ice with them. They will be empowered to say no to collecting unsegregated waste. What’s more? Residents who refuse to toe the line will have to pay up.

In yet another attempt to tackle its waste woes at the beginning of the cycle, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has made it mandatory to segregate at source from February 1. Having managed to get about 35% of the city to segregate its waste, the palike has now set its sights on increasing this number to 60%.

A part of its plan to achieve its self-set target is to collect only wet waste every day. “Sanitary waste, too, will be collected, as waste such as diapers cannot be stored in houses for long,” said Sarfaraz Khan, Joint Commissioner, Solid Waste Management, BBMP. Dry waste collection will happen only twice a week.

Mr. Khan said that residents of individual homes, who refuse to segregate waste, will be penalised after the first week, starting with a Rs. 100 fine for the first offence. This amount will be increased with subsequent offences. “If anyone refuses to pay up, we will recover the amount at the time of collecting the property tax,” he added. This means that the onus is on the owners of housing units given out on rent to ensure that all waste in the building is segregated. Waste from individual houses is said to make up for over 60% of the total waste generated in the city.

The schedule for dry waste collection will differ for each ward. Apart from developing a software to aid the process, conditions will also be laid out in the garbage tenders to further streamline the system.

Apartment complexes will be covered in the second stage of implementation of the plan. The BBMP intends to have as many of them compost wet waste as possible as it aims at reducing the quantity of waste generated, which stands at close to 4,200 tonnes a day including waste from bulk generators.

What you should do

Segregate your waste into wet and dry.

Wet waste (vegetables, fruits, fruit peel, tea powder, coffee powder, flowers, matchsticks, hair, food, cereals an other compostable waste) will be collected every day.

Sanitary and domestic hazardous waste (diapers, syringes, blade, earbuds, bandages, napkins, expired medicines, animal bones, etc.) will also be collected every day.

Dry waste (Plastic: bags, dolls, bottles, milk covers; Paper: cotton boxes, plates, newspapers, packing material; Metal: cans, bottle caps; Others: styrofoam, batteries, bulbs, tubelights, CDs, DVDs, cassettes, etc.) will be collected twice a week.

The biomethanisation plant in Domlur is not the only wet waste management centre that has shut down. Nine other plants commissioned in 2014 were shut down by the first week of January after a tussle between the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike and the contractor.

The BMPP alleges that the contractor has not fulfilled its obligations, while the contractor claims that they have not been paid dues of Rs. 21.09 crore since December 2013. However, it is the residents who are the biggest losers in this fight, as wet waste which was handled locally in these plants are now being transported many kilometres away.

“Monthly payments have not been done for plants where proper maintenance is not done,” said BBMP Joint Commissioner (Solid Waste Management) Sarfaraz Khan. “If they fail to function as per standard operating procedure, the BBMP will take control of the plants. We will rope in residents’ welfare associations (RWAs) if they show interest in managing the plants,” said Mr. Khan. The contractor, Ashoka Biogreen Pvt. Ltd., has refuted these claims. In Varthur ward, where the plant never took off, residents have long been campaigning for the plant to be made functional.

‘We want the plant’

“We want a biogas plant here as it would allow wet waste from at least two or three wards — Varthur, Hagathur and Kadugodi — to be processed locally,” said Anjali Saini, a member of Whitefield Rising, referring to the Varthur plant. This will reduce the incidence of garbage on the streets, she felt, as the pick-up vehicles could make trips in the evening as well. “At the moment, they have to go almost 50 km to drop the waste, so an additional trip is out of the question,” she explained. She felt the idea to bring in the RWAs was ill-conceived. “Why can’t the BBMP manage it on its own?”

In this case, the contractor claimed that the BBMP had not ensured water and electricity connections to the Varthur plant for two years.

In Koramangala, a plant that has been closed for the past 10 days had been processing commercial waste from nearby restaurants. “It helped to manage the commercial waste and to light up lamps in the compound. We are planning to set up a similar plant for handling residential waste,” said Padmasree, president of the Koramangala RWA.

The contractor used to pick up waste and take it to the plant, where another level of segregation was undertaken before processing.

Padmasree,president of Koramangala RWA

If the contractor fails to function as per standard operating procedure, the BBMP will take control of the plants.

Sarfaraz Khan,Joint Commissioner (Solid Waste Management), BBMP