Tulsibaug Ganpati at Alka chowk during Ganpati visarjan procession. (Express Photo by Arul Horizon)In an effort to bring a check on pollution of water bodies during Ganesh festival, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) through SWaCH waste pickers managed to prevent 77 tonnes of Nirmalaya — floral and food offerings – from being dumped into water bodies this year.
For the last few years, SWaCH waste pickers have been providing door-to-door waste collection service in the city. They have also been active in collecting large amount of Nirmalaya during the Ganesh festival and sending it for composting.
This year, SWaCH waste pickers deployed 48 containers and collected approximately 77 tonnes of Nirmalaya on September 5 and 9. Organisations like Janwani and Tham Creative also participated in this initiative. Students from Sinhagad Institutes, Kohinoor Foundation and Symbiosis School of Economics also volunteered to collect the offerings and spread awareness about the cause. The collected Nirmalaya has been sent to Commins and Dr Nanasaheb Dharmadhikari Pratishthan for composting.
Besides, PMC, Ecoexist and other social organisations jointly implemented Punaravartan, the clay-recycling initiative, which also received a good response from citizens.
This year, waste pickers set up 13 collection points across the city for Nirmalaya at Garware College, Katraj Ghat, Vridheshwar ghat, Shahu Garden, Chima Ghat, Vitthalwadi, Warje, Karvenagar, Bund Garden, Aundh Gaon, Pashan Ghat, S M Joshi Bridge and Bhide Bridge. As many as 243 SWaCH waste pickers were deployed in the collection work.
SWaCH director Harshad Barde said: “With joint efforts by PMC, SWaCH waste pickers and citizens, votive offerings are transformed into environment-friendly composts. PMC and SWaCH with the support of Punekars once again contributed to conserving the city’s environment.”
Shobha Bansode, a waste picker representative for SwaCH, said, “We have been collecting Nirmalaya for almost 15 years now. As part of Nirmalya to Nisarga initiative, we ask citizens to handover Nirmalaya to avoid river pollution and celebrate eco-friendly festival. Most of the citizens hand over segregated Nirmalaya. Yet, few give mixed Nirmalaya. Citizens should join the movement for a clean city with active participation. Pune city is leading by example and inspiring other cities and local bodies to take up such initiatives.”
For many decades, it was an established practice for informal waste pickers of Pune to attend visarjan at ghats in order to retrieve and collect Nirmalaya, dry recyclables, fruits and other offerings given to them by devotees. Since 2009, waste pickers of SWaCH Cooperative, with the help of PMC, civil society organisations and local stakeholders, have formalised the existing system to ensure segregated collection of Nirmalaya, dry recyclables and other offerings at ghats and divert it towards composting, recycling, consumption or processing. The system has significantly reduced the quantum of votive offerings disposed at the riverside.