The Hindu 31.12.2009
Surampatty Municipality suffers without garbage disposal yard
Staff Reporter
– PHOTO:M. GOVARTHAN
No respite: Residents of Kasipalayam and neighbouring areas have been suffering because of garbage dumped in the area.
ERODE: Surampatty Municipality, a grade three civic body, has been dumping garbage all around - on road sides, vacant plots and almost at any place that is far from human habitation.
The reason: it doesn’t have a proper garbage disposal yard and mechanism in place.
The two metric tonnes of biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste it collects is just collected and dumped.
For the purpose of dumping waste, without proper treatment, it employs 50 containers, two tractors and as many lorries and five tricycles.
And, such dumping has landed the civic body, which has a population of about 55,000, in trouble.
Residents of the area where it dumps garbage complain of pollution.
Ward 1 Councillor of neighbouring Kasipalayam Municipality P. Krishnaveni says the garbage the Surampatty civic body dumps in Kasipalayam village affects about 2,500 families.
The smoke from the burning garbage troubles the students of the nearby government middle school, some of who have fainted and felt nausea, she says.
She regrets that the problem has been going on for the past 15 years and the dumped garbage resembles a hillock in the Bharathipuram area. Surampatty officials say the reason the civic body has been dumping all over is because they don’t have a land to dispose of the garbage in a safe and proper manner.
“No land is available within the Municipality limits to set up a garbage disposal yard. And, the lands the Municipality identified for the purpose have not been put to use because of opposition from the public of the area,” says Executive Officer G. Maryammal.
The civic body first identified a land in Muthampalayam and then in Mettunasuvanpalayam, near Bhavani. After failing in the attempts, the civic body took up the issue with the District Collector and Municipal Administration Department.
Letter
Municipality Chairman V.S. Loganathan says the civic body wrote to the Commissioner of Municipal Administration asking for help to safely dispose of the garbage and the latter wrote to the Commissioner of Erode Corporation to accommodate Surampatty’s garbage.
The CMA wrote a letter to the Corporation in February this year and followed it up with another in September following a court order but the Corporation has not helped, he says.
“It (Erode Corporation) has not come forward to help Surampatty Municipality, which will soon become a part of the former,” he says and accuses it of violating orders.
Erode Corporation on its part says when it is finding it difficult to manage its own garbage it will only be a burden to take waste from Surampatty.
Left with no option, Surampatty Municipality officials say they have again written to CMA for further orders and have also sought the help of District Collector.
