PMC to review waste transition centre project in Bavdhan after protests

“A committee will be set up to review the project and issues raised by local residents, environmentalists and elected representatives will be taken into consideration,” Kumar told the delegation on Monday.

Residents and environmentalists had formed a human chain Sunday to protest against the project.

Kumar said there will be no direct connect between the river and the garbage project and the civic administration will “take proper care for it”. “The issue will be catered on the lines of the riverfront development project being implemented in the city,” he said.

The garbage processing plant in Vanaz is being shifted to Bavdhan because the former site will be given over to the Pune Metro project. Kumar said, “The PMC is not going to set up a processing plant but a segregation and transportation centre for garbage collected from the city. There will not be any dumping of garbage. The Ramnadi will be developed in the same way we are planning the development of Mula-Mutha river.”

Patil said, “The PMC clarified it will not be a waste processing plant but a transition centre, where the collected waste will be segregated and transported to processing plants. However, the concern is over the environmental issues considering it’s close to Ramnadi with residents saying the project is within the blueline of the river but the civic administration claiming the opposite,” he said.

The civic general body had rejected the project in Bavdhan, Patil said, adding, “The civic administration, under the belief it will get the state government’s approval, is going ahead with the project. However, they will keep the work on hold unless the concerns of residents are resolved.”

Former BJP corporator Dilip Wede-Patil said the project is going to affect 50,000 local residents. “It will be wrong to execute the project considering a national highway on one side of the project site and a river on the other,” he said.