Dr Raja Muzaffar Bhat
Few days back I visited Lassipora Watrehail which is a remote area of Budgam . This village is one of the remotest villages of my district but unfortunately it hasn’t been declared as a backward area (RBA) by authorities with the result the living condition of local residents hasn’t changed much. Most of the youth in this village are unemployed and one can only find very few Government employees in Lassipora. While I was entering into Lassipora , I saw heaps of polythene and other garbage been thrown into a gorge located in the middle of this tiny village. I had to attend a school programme at Lassipora organised by an NGO in association with District Police Budgam. When I was asked to speak during the function all my focus shifted from school education to management of solid waste in that village. I requested the local elders and youth to segregate the said garbage so that it is properly disposed off in a scientific manner. When it was the turn of SSP Budgam Fayaz Ahmad Lone to speak during the function , he also laid emphasis on sanitation and managing the solid waste in villages. In-fact one young man from this village Mujtaba Bashir who has done his Post Graduation and has been trained on Solid Waste Management by BASIX group at Indore and Bhopal. Mujtaba’s another colleague Ishtiyaq who also hails from a nearby remote village has also been trained on solid waste management. Mujtaba and Ishtiyaq plan to work with some local town committees and Tourism development authorities in the coming days. I advised Mujtaba to work for his village also so that people start segregating bio degradable and non biodegradable waste material at source (house). For dumping bio degradable waste there is need of compost pits and managing polythene / plastic waste a dumping place is needed. Mujtaba and Ishtiyaq told me “In cities and towns Municipalities do all this work and they lift all garbage from different localities. If Municipal officials and Urban civic bodies are trained , they can do door to door collection of solid and wet waste also , but how can we manage all this in villages as there is no such authority / manpower available ” ? My answer was funds provided under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Gurantee Scheme (MG-NREGS) or NREGA can be utilized for this kind of work.
NREGA and Solid Waste Management ?
The basic idea of launching MG-NREGS or NREGA is to create jobs within the village so that migration of people is stopped and poverty is eradicated. Another aspect of this scheme is to create sustainable assets for the village like concrete lanes , drains , retaining walls , and small link roads. If some of the NREGA funds are diverted towards solid waste management , aren’t we creating jobs for the local unemployed people ? Making village clean and garbage free and constructing compost pits , purchasing hand carts to carry garbage etc , aren’t these assets going to be owned by a village ? Lot of developmental work has been done in villages from last several years under NREGA , if we earmark some funds for sanitation & solid waste management also , what is wrong in it ? Heaps of garbage and wet waste is lying scattered in our villages , our water bodies have been chocked due to accumulation of polythene and there is no policy to manage it. We are all mute spectators as we have no policy for solid waste management in rural areas of our state . It would be wise enough to manage it through NREGA funds. Locals people who will undertake door to door collection of waste can be paid under the NREGA funds and this process must continue. In addition to it we have other sanitation programmes like Swatch Bharat Mission (SBM) and funds under this scheme can also help us to make our villages look cleaner and greener.
Conclusion :
Managing Solid Waste should not be restricted to big cities or towns. Our rural areas are also seriously affected with the menace of garbage. Our Government must seriously think over this issue. I would sincerely appeal to the Chief Minister of the State, whosoever may be at the helm of affairs to seriously think over the issue of managing solid waste in rural areas. This management is not at all possible unless we make use of NREGA funds. Through the scientific method of Segregation we can not only clean up our villages, but we can produce some bio fertilizer as well by compositing the bio degradable waste (wet waste) in concrete compost pits. To manage other kinds of plastic and polythene , small polythene processing units can be established , each one for 3 to 4 villages and these units won’t cost more than 10 lakhs and local entrepreneurs can be asked to establish these units with the support of Government. Polythene / plastic can be converted into pellets in these small scale industrial units which can be sold to various plastic based factories.
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