Friday, December 5, 2008

Safai Karamcharis and the state of cleanliness in gurgaon city




Sulabh International has been given the contract for cleanliness in large parts of gurgaon city. As per the contract signed between H.U.D.A and Sulabh international, the organisation after sweeping the streets will pickup solid waste to be disposed off at a predetermined place as designated or instructed by H.U.D.A or haryana urban development authority. I am not aware if contracts have been signed with other authorities or agencies in gurgaon by sulabh international.

The contract signed with H.U.D.A also carries a clause that the solid waste will not be burnt and has to be disposed off. In case solid waste is burnt a penalty will be charged. (Here in the above photos you can see sulabh safai karamcharis smoking while garbage is burning. The karamcharis can be identified with the blue overall with Sulabh written across the back)

With the tolerance levels exhibited by both our administrators and citizens solid waste is regularly burnt irrespective of the fact both residents of gurgaon and the sweeper staff are aware of the environmental and health effects of burning garbage. The status quo remains as nobody wants to bell the cat. The residents are too lazy to object with a large number of residents encouraging the sweepers to burn garbage whereas the sweepers are too lazy to pick up and dispose garbage and in the absence of anybody objecting are too happy to burn garbage and laze around.

If the solution for cleanliness of the city is by burning garbage and if a large number of residents feel no problem in burning garbage and in fact burn garbage themselves then why does the district administration waste so much money (what i heard is that the sulabh contract was worth over 70lacs) in hiring a cleaning agency. let everybody fend for themselves, clean the place and burn the garbage. At least that money can be diverted into some better use.


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