Indiscriminate burning of waste on streets has raised health concern among the residents of Karumandapam and Dheeran Nagar in the city.
Thanks to rapid urbanisation in recent years, a number of residential colonies have sprung up on both sides of Karumandapam from National College to Dheeran Nagar. Karumandapam has become one of the major residential localities in the city with hundreds of houses in Sakthi Nagar, Jaya Nagar, R.M.S. Colony, Kalyanasundaram Nagar and Thiru Nagar. Similarly, a large number of commercial establishments including restaurants, roadside eateries, grocery shops and meat stalls have also come up in the recent past.
Though the workers employed by Tiruchi Corporation visit various residential colonies in Karumandapam for door-to-door waste collection, there are complaints that collection of waste is not regular and garbage collectors refuse to collect non-recyclable discards, dried up leaves and broken branches of trees.
Due to inefficient garbage collection mechanism and absence of garbage bins on streets, residents dump waste on roads, vacant plots and abandoned buildings. The traders too clandestinely dump waste on roads at their will. A section of them invariably dumps waste generated from their shops on the bunds of the Koraiyaru river. It is alleged that meat traders have literally converted the bunds of the Koraiyaur river into a dump yard. What is worrying the residents is the burning of waste on the bunds. Unthinking of the pollution, it is alleged that some traders set fire to the garbage such as plastic bottles, plastic carry bags, chicken waste and food waste at night.
Local residents say that it has become a perennial practice.
“The bunds of the Koraiyarur river have become a convenient location for indiscriminate dumping of waste and burning the same. We undergo testing time due to air pollution caused by the burning of waste,”says G. Jayakumar, a resident of Sagkthi Nagar.
E. Mohammed Ali, a resident of Thiru Nagar, said the question of burning of waste would not arise if garbage collection mechanism was effective. “If garbage piles up for three to four days without being collected by sanitary workers, the residents have no other way but to dump the waste on the streets. The Corporation should take serious note of the issue so as to improve the system,” he added.