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Residents of Pimpri-Chinchwad this morning woke up to find grime and garbage spreading an unbearable stink and becoming eyesore.
For, the private vehicles, numbering 50, which collect garbage from every nook and corner of the industrial town did not turn up. The owners of these vehicles are demanding a rise in their garbage collection amount which the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation is not ready to accept.
“Aaj sagli kadhe kachrach kachrach zalay (there is garbage everywhere today),” said Kalpesh Pagaria, a medical store owner. Like Pagaria, residents in almost every congested suburb of Dapodi, Phugewadi, Bhosari, Pimpri, Kasarwadi, Chinchwad, Kalewadi, Thergaon, Sangvi and Pimple Gurav complained that garbage bins and containers placed in residential areas were overflowing with no action coming forth from the civic administration. The worst-affected were people in suburbs where the PCMC had kept garbage containers right in residential areas. The overflowing containers were being rummaged by dogs, cows and donkeys who
were spreading the muck all over. The PCMC lifts nearly 450 tonne of garbage everyday from the length and breadth of the township and deposits it at the Kachra Depot at Moshi. So on Saturday, the PCMC claimed that its own 33 vehicles and compactors lifted as much as garbage possible. “But because of the sudden strike by the private operators, garbage in many areas was not lifted. On Sunday, we will ensure that entire garbage is lifted,” he said. Kunachgi said he told the private operators to wait till Municipal Commissioner Dilip Band, who is outstation, returns. “They are seeking an immediate hike which is not possible. We have now decided to remove these vehicles,” he said. Kunachgi said so far the PCMC was paying the operators on the weight of the garbage lifted.
“We had decided to change to paying them by number of containers lifted. They were also supposed to clean the containers and keep the area around it clean. We had also decided to appoint one of our employees to oversee the lifting work. Some of these criteria which were being applied were opposed by the operators who are also demanding a hike,” he said.
Kunachgi said PCMC had recently purchased six compactors and had plans to purchase more.
“Each of these containers can lift 18 cubic metre of garbage which is like lifting garbage from over 100 containers at one go,” he said. “Once we buy more compactors, we will not need private operators on whom the PCMC was spending Rs two to three crore every year,” he said. PCMC ‘C’ divisional chief R D Gaikwad said of the over 100 garbage containers in his division, 50 must have been cleared. In short, it was a day when citizens in Pimpri-Chinchwad had to make do with garbage and the stink from it.
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