Jawaharnagar dumpyard issue: Bandi needs to take a hard look at facts

The State government has already spent Rs.146 crore and capped the dump yard, apart from already starting to generate power from the municipal solid waste power project at the site.

Hyderabad: Levelling allegations comes quite easy for the Bharatiya Janata Party’s State president, Bandi Sanjay Kumar. What he however forgets is that his allegations, the latest being that the State government was ignoring the pollution problem at the Jawahar Nagar dump yard and not taking up any remedial measures, are easily rubbished when facts are considered.

And the facts given below are from the Central Pollution Control Board website, and from government records including questions and answers given by Union Ministers in the Rajya Sabha, which are there for everyone to see.

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Firstly, the charge that the State had not done anything: The State government has already spent Rs.146 crore and capped the dump yard, apart from already starting to generate power from the municipal solid waste power project at the site. This is of 19.8MW, the first such Waste-To-Energy (WTE) plant commissioned in South India, with another 28MW WTE unit almost ready for commissioning.

That is not all. A 2 MLD leachate treatment plant is being set up and 1 MLD is already functional. Efforts are on to ensure that the plant is working on full capacity by October, with the target being to exhaust the leachate in the main Malkaram Tank in six months, all this while attempting to manage the legacy dump, which has a staggering 12 million tonnes of waste dumped over more than 20 years.

The situation in other States, especially in BJP-ruled States, can be understood from the fact that such WTE initiatives that are already up and running are rare, with Gujarat having one project, generating 7.5MW, Haryana having one project of 8MW capacity and Madhya Pradesh with one 11.5MW project, as per Rajya Sabha records.

What the BJP State chief also forgot is that the solid waste disposal practices and measures initiated by the State government, including to rejuvenate and to protect water bodies in the State have ensured that the number of contaminated sites in Telangana is much lower than those in other States. According to the CPCB, the State has only two contaminated sites, the Noor Mohammed Kunta in Katedan and Naka Vagu in Patancheru. This is when, BJP-ruled States account for at least 50 of the total 112 contaminated sites across the country. Uttar Pradesh leads the list with 21, followed by Gujarat with 8, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka with 6 each and Haryana with four.

The dilemma of large dump yards turning becoming a point of worry is also not restricted to Hyderabad. In fact, Bandi Sanjay Kumar could check what is happening with Gujarat’s 84-hectare Pirana site, where municipal solid waste generated from Ahmedabad city and surrounding areas is dumped.

Forget capping or WTE plants, the landfill site according to recent reports, is still a major headache for the Amdavad Municipal Corporation, which is struggling to meet the deadline set in August 2020 by the National Green Tribunal to move the dumpsite within two years. A WTE project has not taken off, neither has a plan to convert the waste into CNG.

In Bengaluru, a city under BJP rule for several years, waste from the city is turning out to be a major problem for surrounding areas, with the situation in Mavallipura being what Bandi Sanjay Kumar could have a look at. From Mandur to Bellahalli to Mittaganahalli or even Bagalur, none of the landfills have seen efforts like those taken up at Jawahar Nagar. But then, that would matter only if the BJP State chief was bothered about facts.