The Hindu 19.09.2009

Lalur: Corporation to seek more time from High Court

Staff Reporter

Thrissur: An emergency meeting of the Thrissur Corporation on Friday unanimously passed a resolution to seek more time from the High Court to redress the Lalur waste management issue.

A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court on Tuesday had directed the Thrissur Corporation to start removing garbage from Lalur within a week.

The order was on the basis of a report submitted by District and Sessions Judge B. Kemal Pasha after inspecting the Lalur dump yard. The HC Bench directed the Corporation to file an action-taken report within two weeks.

The council meeting, chaired by Deputy Mayor M. Vijayan in the absence of the Mayor, noted that it was difficult to begin the work in one week. “The tenders called for the purpose will be opened on Saturday. As the next two days are holidays, a decision can be taken only on Tuesday,” the Deputy Mayor said.

The council also decided to conduct a department-level inquiry into the recent attempt to dig trenches at the Lalur dumpyard to bury waste, which infuriated local residents.

Vigilance probe

Demanding vigilance inquiry into the alleged nexus between contractors for waste management at Lalur and Corporation officials, Opposition councillors James Pellissery and Rajan Pallan sat in protest at the well of the council.

They also demanded a ban on non-reusable plastics. Later, the council gave the green signal for the vigilance inquiry against the contractors for the alleged mismanagement of the waste treatment plant.

Opposition leader I.P. Paul alleged that the condition at Lalur had aggravated as the Corporation failed to initiate effective measures to address the issue.

“The Corporation did not implement the steps recommended by an all-party meeting held at the Corporation on August 3, chaired by Local Administration Minister Paloli Mohammed Kutty.

The recommendations included assigning an expert team to study the problems at Lalur and holding a meeting of flat associations, hotel owners and residents’ associations to sensitise them to the issue,” he said.

The Hindu 19.09.2009

Biodiversity panels in all local bodies soon

Special Correspondent

KOCHI: Biodiversity Management Committees (BMC), which will facilitate taking stock of the bio-resources, will be set up in all panchayats and municipalities in Ernakulam district by October 5.

This was decided at a district-level workshop for heads of local bodies organised by the Kerala State Biodiversity Board (KSBB) here on Friday. The workshop explained to the panchayat presidents and secretaries the concept and methodology of formation of BMCs and compiling of people’s biodiversity registers (PBR) in each panchayat. It also decided that panchayats’ and municipalities’ plan funds should be used for the compilation of the biodiversity registers. The Kerala Biological Diversity Rules 2008 mandates that “every local body shall constitute a BMC within its area of jurisdiction.” The key task of the BMC is “to ensure conservation, utilisation and equitable sharing of benefits from the biodiversity.” The BMCs at panchayat, municipal and city corporation levels are tasked with the compilation of the biodiversity registers using the process and format set by the Biodiversity Board.

M.L. Joseph, district coordinator of the biodiversity register project, told The Hindu that the PBR would gather information, within two to five months, on the different varieties of plants and animals available in each panchayat in the district. Apart from plants and animals, the traditional knowledge associated with them which were available with the respective communities for generations—for example, the medicinal property of a particular plant and its use— would also be gathered. F. George D’Cruz, senior programme coordinator of the KSBB, said each of the BMCs, headed by the panchayat president, would have not more than six members representing farmers, herbalists, fishworkers, non-timber forest produce collectors and related fields.Of them two would be women and one from the SC/ST communities.