Citizen Connect: Raja Street’s source segregation plan fails to take off, residents blame Corporation

However, just a few months down the line, residents have little hope of transforming the area, thanks to the lackadaisical approach by the agencies collecting garbage and the apathy of some of the residents.

Kanthi Neelamekam of Mandaveli Raja Street Residents Welfare Association said they have been having a tussle with the agency collecting garbage to ensure they visit the area on time. “They are supposed to clean the main roads from 8 am to 10 am, and come to the streets inside between 10 am and 2 pm. But it takes more than a phone call to the agency to get them to send staff here. We are told that three people have been allotted to our area, but we have to keep reminding the supervisor, who repeats the same answer — ‘we will send people’. We send pictures of overflowing dustbins, too, seeking prompt action and it is extremely frustrating.”

The residents in nearby areas like Raja Gramani Garden have also been trained to source segregate. She added that though residents must be blamed for the lukewarm response to the idea of source segregation, those who are involved in it are discouraged by the shoddy garbage collection. “The dry waste is not being collected, too,” he said.

V Santhosh Kumar, secretary of the association, added that for the segregation efforts to succeed, the Zonal officials of the city corporation have to involve directly with the community. “The supervisor or the conservancy staff cannot make the community adhere to the source segregation rules. Everywhere, resident associations are taking up the initiative. But they lack support from the Corporation,” he said.

Kanthi said that they plan to meet the Zonal officials to bring about a movement like the one in Madukkarai in Coimbatore that has set a classic example for source segregation.

However, a senior official from Zone 13 claimed they have not received any complaints from the residents so far.