Just one filthy, overflowing bin

Swati Suryawanshi, resident of Bhagyodayanagar, KondhwaThose of us who live in Kondhwa are an unlucky lot. More than two years ago, 38 fr...

Swati Suryawanshi, resident of Bhagyodayanagar, Kondhwa
Those of us who live in Kondhwa are an unlucky lot. More than two years ago, 38 fringe villages along with ours were merged with the Pune Municipal Corporation. But the basic amenities are yet to trickle in. We have yet to get proper drainage and sanitation facilities.

In our area, hygiene is totally lacking. We have open gutters and especially in the monsoon it is an utter mess. The residents prefer to let the garbage rot outside their houses or they simply dump it in front of someone else’s place. Better still, if there is an open plot, one person begins dumping the garbage. Then others follow and it turns into a garbage heap which is never cleaned by the PMC.

If we have to throw our garbage, the conscientious among us, have to walk half a kilometre on to the main road near Konark Puram to the only dumper-placer to dispose it off. In an area where new housing complexes are coming up by the night, we need more bins. At present, there is only one. How can it cater to so many residents? Most often this one bin is overflowing. Imagine the germs and disease it will spread.

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Sometimes, the dumper-placer is not towed away for days on end and the garbage reaches such a point that it lands up on the road. We cannot walk past the bin without holding our handkerchieves to our noses. The stench is revolting and unbearable. There is also the danger of being bitten by the stray dogs that are always around the bin. They are foraging for food and snarl and growl menacingly when we try to chuck our garbage. We are paying our taxes to the PMC.

But sadly, it is not taking care of the cleanliness in our area. Now, they say the garbage depot is shifting to Undri-Pisoli which is in our area. The PMC says the depot is away from densely populated area. But even in these small villages, development is going ahead in leaps and bounds. We feel, after five or ten years, the situation will be the same as it was with Kothrud.

What will happen then? Why doesn’t the PMC spend some money on educating people in these fringe villages on how to treat garbage?. Why don’t their officials teach us about vermiculture? Till their infrastructure improves, this will surely help us keep our area clean. We don’t even know whom to complain to when the garbage is overflowing. Looking at the way the PMC moves, we in the fringe villages are surely a hapless lot.