The solid waste management concessionaire, Ecogreen, ceased doorstep and secondary garbage collection, once again leaving the city in uncertainty. According to representatives of the company, the strike has been initiated due to the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) failing to settle an outstanding amount of Rs 80 crore.
Sources indicate that the civic body recently invoked Ecogreen’s bank guarantee of Rs 33.4 crore as a means of recovering funds for works carried out at the concessionaire’s expense, adding another factor to the ongoing strike.
MCG officials, meanwhile, said they are “better equipped” this time and have hired two private agencies for secondary waste collection, which started working on Wednesday. The corporation has now asked sanitation agencies which are sweeping roads and public places, as well as vendors and RWAs, to step in for doorstep waste collection. Officials also said that this strike will have the “least impact” on waste management since the civic body already prepared a backup plan.
“We have hired two agencies to take up secondary waste collection from Wednesday. For the primary waste collection, vendors which were already working in some colonies have been asked to step in so that doorstep waste collection is not impacted. We have also handed over the primary waste collection to certain RWAs and want more RWAs to cooperate with us. Sanitation agencies have also been asked to collect waste from households as a stop-gap arrangement. We were already prepared for a situation like this. We have also floated tenders for outsourcing door-to-door waste collection and will soon hire agencies for it,” said MCG joint commissioner (Swachh Bharat Mission) Naresh Kumar.
The civic body has already served a preliminary termination notice to the concessionaire over its failure to manage the city’s waste. MCG recently also called a meeting of sub-vendors of Ecogreen. They have been asked to produce a ‘satisfaction letter’ issued by the RWAs of the areas they are working in to ensure that they are performing well, so that MCG can take a decision on whether these vendors can continue their work.” Residents have raised concerns about the inconsistent garbage collection for over two weeks now.
“The repercussions of this strike will become evident in the upcoming days, as secondary waste collection points will also reach full capacity. In such a situation, Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs) across the city can contribute by engaging vendors for primary waste collection in their societies and colonies. We can collaborate with MCG and manage primary waste collection by outsourcing it to a private agency at the colony level,” suggested Sudakshina Laha, the general secretary of Sushant Lok 2 and 3 RWA.
