Urban News

The Deccan Chronicle  02.11.2010

Nov. 1: The Chennai Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (CMWSSB) has identified 350 streets in the city as affected by ‘chronic’ sewage overflow and blocks. Most of these streets are in slums located in the pockets of north and south Chennai, while some are in prime localities like Mylapore and Mandaveli.

The board is undertaking a drive to solve sewage-related problems in Chennai metropolis and the streets have been identified in the last 10 days. Senior CMWSSB officials told this newspaper that the streets were identified on the basis of the number of blocks, overflow complaints received and number of sewer cleaning trucks operating there.

“More such streets would be mapped shortly,” added the officials. CMWSSB engineers feel that the number of such ‘chronically-affected’ streets could double at the end of the identification exercise.

On an average, the board receives around 18,000 complaints per month at the rate of over 600 per day. Most of the complaints are related to sewer block and overflowing manholes besides sporadic cases of short supply of drinking water. Linking of mushrooming residential complexes to the existing sewer lines has been one of the major causes of sewage overflow and blockade in the city,said officials.

Besides involving CMWSSB engineers, the board will also study project reports submitted by various consultancies in the last decade to streamline the sewer system of the rapidly growing city. The board would shortly prepare estimates for the remedial works and subsequently float tenders. The works would be taken up in early January 2011 and completed before mid February.

The Hindu      02.11.2010

Cracker merchants told not to dump waste indiscriminately

Coimbatore: Coimbatore Mayor R. Venkatachalam has asked the cracker merchants not to dump carton boxes and wastes on the road or inside sewerage lines.

Mr. Venkatachalam conducted a meeting with the merchants which was attended by Deputy Commissioner S. Prabhakaran, Health Committee Chairman Nachimuthu and City Health Officer P. Aruna. He said that plastic is banned in Coimbatore and merchants should co-operate in keeping the city clean.

He has advised the merchants and the public to segregate bio-degradable and non-degradable wastes before handing them over to Corporation workers.

He also asked the merchants to remit their taxes and rentals to the Corporation without delay in order to carry on the development works.

Waste water

Shops dealing with eatables should have the electric lights and machines for keeping the flies and insects at bay, he said.

Similarly, slaughter houses and meat stalls should ensure that the waste water is not let into the drainage, the Mayor said.

Hand-held machines

Corporation has planned to provide hand-held machines for assessing water charges and for issuing receipts on collection of water charges. At present the machines were launched in West Zone by Mayor R. Venkatachalam and Commissioner Anshul Mishra.

In the first phase 28 machines were being given in South and West Zones and in future all the zones and all bill collectors would be equipped with these machines.

Heath camp

“Varumun Kappom”, a preventive health camp, was conducted by the Corporation in Kottaimedu Ward Number 27 recently.

A release from the civic body said that so far as many as 24 such camps had been conducted and as many as 25,072 people benefitted and were provided with Rs 2.41 lakh worth of medicines.

In these camps, 2,319 pregnant women availed the benefit of scanning, 1,665 patients availed ECG, 18,311 patients benefitted by going through blood screening, 5,033 availed diabetes screening, 8,640 went through urine tests for detection of diabetes.