Ludhiana: The volunteers of almost seven colleges are these days busy createing awareness among the people living in areas around Buddha Nullah under the ‘Buddha Dariya Cleanliness Drive’, especially the migrant population living in ‘vehras’ located in these colonies as they are the major violators of the ban on throwing of solid waste into the drain. On Wednesday, the civic officials checked areas from Haibowal bridge to Pavitar Nagar bridge, where they found many such ‘vehras’ and most of the occupants of these ‘vehras’ usually throw garbage into the drain.
The Swachh Bharat Mission project director, Puran Singh, visited these areas in the morning and met around 100 people. While meeting people, he found that these ‘vehras’ were housing 50 to 100 people and the civic amenities there were very poor. He said these people do not know about source segregation and they do not even hand over garbage to waste collectors and instead throw the same directly into the drain.
He said they had given a strict warning to these people to keep waste in segregated form and give it to the garbage collectors. He said the area chief sanitary inspectors or other staff members were also with them and they were told to keep regular checking in these areas so that violators could be punished.
Meanwhile, NCC/NSS volunteers paid a visit to the colonies around the drain. Two students of Arya College for Women Suhana Kapoor and Amisha Sharma said, “We meet many people in one day, some listen carefully while some others object to the drive. But when they explain them about the harmful impact of throwing of plastic carry bags and waste into the drain, they paid heed to us.” They said they did not face any difficulties and now people had started even giving suggestions for making this drive successful.
Nodal officer Maheshwar Singh said, “We have started getting response from people as on Wednesday, some of the people even volunteered to join the awareness drive and promised to stop others from throwing garbage into the drain.” He said they had instructed some meat shops along the banks of the drain to keep separate dustbins for throwing garbage and other waste.