Court fines 7 societies Rs 15,000 each for flouting waste rules

MUMBAI: A metropolitan magistrate’s court has imposed a penalty of Rs 15,000 each on seven societies for not processing their wet waste under the new BMC rule.
While the BMC had dragged these societies to court for violating rules and not paying the fines it had imposed on them, there was much talk about how it did not do the same with government institutions that broke these rules, including Mantralaya.




Recently, the BMC made it compulsory for bulk generators to set up wet waste processing units on their premises. Many violators found that the BMC had either imposed a fine on them or filed a police case against them, depending on the rules broken.

Where police complaints were filed, the BMC left it to the force to pursue the matter, but where the BMC had imposed fines and found these were not paid, it went to court to prosecute the offending establishments.

All seven societies penalised by the court are in M-East ward comprising Chembur, Govandi and Deonar. The seven had refused to pay the fine imposed by the BMC.

The BMC had imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on Mantralaya as well for not segregating and processing its wet waste last year. This fine was not paid but the BMC is yet to take Mantralaya to court.

BMC officials said they had given repeated warnings to bulk generators — housing societies and establishments that produce more than 100 kg of waste daily or have an area of more than 20,000 square metres — for breaking the rule. Officials said that they started imposing fines on the violators from last year and started filing police complaint against some of them from last month.

The M-East ward officer had given notices to 32 societies in the area, of which 21 initiated the process of setting up wet waste processing units and 11 refused citing lack of space or other difficulties. The 11 were asked to pay a fine by the BMC and dragged to court when they failed to pay it.

“The court penalized seven societies and gave 30 days to the remaining four to follow the waste processing rule,” said BMC ward officer Srinivas Kilje.

The BMC move aims to reduce the burden on the three dumping grounds in the city as these are already full. After the implementation of the rule, in January the daily garbage arrival at the dumping grounds had come down from 7,800 tonnes to 7,200 tonnes. The BMC wants to reduce it to 6,000 tonnes.