Dumper bins back in Jubilee Hills

HYDERABAD: Heaps of garbage, plastic covers and putrid smell with a dumper bin rising from their midst—the ubiquitous scene might soon mark the sleek environs of Jubilee Hills too if the effort by a group of women is turned to a naught by the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation.
Women’s initiative

Jubilee Hills Civic Exnora, a 10-year-old voluntary initiative by the women, which introduced an improved way of garbage collection and disposal, now finds the task difficult as the municipal authorities have brought back the blue dumpers at various locations.

“With the dumper bins marking the streets again, the residents are asking why they should pay us for garbage collection when there is no respite from the bins,” complains Indira Lingam, the founder-member of the Jubilee Hills Civic Exnora.

She led a group of 20 volunteers who began a door-to-door garbage collection at Jubilee Hills under the banner of Civic Exnora ten years ago.

The then GHMC Commissioner S.K. Aurora was very cooperative in launching the movement, says Ms. Lingam.

Their attempt to rope in street urchins and provide them with tricycles to move from house to house and collect garbage won accolades even from the high ranking officials.
Residents’ contribution

The garbage thus collected is be dumped on the premises provided by the GHMC, from where it is be cleared every day by a municipal vehicle.

A sum of Rs.150 per quarter is collected from each household for all these services. The drive covers about 2,000 houses and commercial establishments in Jubilee Hills, Film Nagar, Kavuri Hills, Prashasan Nagar and Navnirman Nagar.

Related interventions by the organisation include weaning the workers away from drug abuse, providing them daily breakfast and imparting minimal education. Many workers, Ms. Lingam says, were even encouraged to find better livelihoods as taxi and auto drivers.
Threats received

“For the past two years, GHMC has been trying relentlessly to bring back the dumpers. We have made many representations to the Commissioner and Additional Commissioners concerned, but all fell on deaf ears. Our effort of ten years will go waste if the dumpers are back in the localities,” says Ms. Lingam. She alleges that a few commercial establishments have stopped using the organisation’s services after receiving threats from municipal authorities.