The Hindu 09.06.2010
Garbage mound poses health hazard to school students
Staff Reporter
| Corporation workers not cleaning bins regularly |
— PHOTO:M.GOVARTHAN 
Health Risk:Garbage heap in front of a Corporation middle school at Vinayagar Temple Street in Karungalpalayam, Erode.
ERODE: The indiscriminate dumping of garbage near the Erode Corporation Middle School at Vinayagar Temple Street in Karungalpalayam here poses serious threat to the health of students.
Residents in the street and a few commercial establishments dispose the waste in the bin kept near the school. As the Corporation is not carrying out regular cleaning, the bin overflows and the residents are forced to dump waste on the roadsides.
Students studying in the school are often found playing near the bin, risking their health.
Stench
“The stench emanating from the heaps of rotting garbage has become unbearable these days. The uncollected garbage also attracts stray dogs in large number,” teachers in the school say.
The school has over 500 students and majority of them belong to the families listed below the poverty line. “Some of the students come to school without wearing footwear. Children often walk over the heaps of garbage,” teachers point out.
Parents expressed serious concern over the poor sanitary conditions in the area as the authorities responsible were not doing their work. “The Corporation should send in trucks and workers to clear the rubbish on a regular basis,” they say.
“Otherwise, there will be continuous outbreak of diseases like cholera and dysentery.”
Teachers and parents had appealed to the civic authorities on several occasions to remove the garbage bin and prevent people from dumping waste near the school. “But no one listened to our pleas,” parents allege.
The haphazard dumping of waste continues in almost all parts of the town as the authorities are not doing much to solve the problem.
It is very common to see heaps of garbage along the streets, pathways and roads in the town.
The situation is grim in the thickly populated areas falling under Sooramangalam and Veerappan Chatram municipalities.
Mounds of rotting garbage lie uncollected in many residential colonies in these municipalities for weeks together.
