The residents of the Electronic City phase-2 find it difficult to tolerate the stench that the Solid Waste Management plant at Chikkanagamangala emits. Continuous protest and complaints have failed to resolve the issue.
Labani Mahanandy
Residents of Electronic City phase-2 find it difficult to live due to the foul smell emitted by the Solid Waste Management (SWM) plant in Chikkanagamangala.
Deepu Chandran, who lives in Phase 2 says, “It is really difficult to cross this area let alone staying. But we don’t have any option. We have protested many times about this but still no changes made till date.”
Nirupama Pillai, another resident of the area expressed her displeasure. She said, “I live almost one and a half kilometres away from the plant but the stink from the plant reaches us very easily and sometimes goes to Phase 1 too. There are also people living around 200 to 300 meters away from the place and they are not even able to open their window for both the smell and the swarm of flies.”
They had complained to Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) several times and no measures have been taken yet.
Manjula Rao from the Solid Waste Management department of BBMP agreed that the SWM plant in the area stinks.
She said, “It depends on the moisture level of the waste that is received. If the moisture level is high the stink will be high too. Every now and then SWM plants turn the waste periodically to make sure there is aeration in the heaps of waste. During that procedure whatever gas gets produced like methane and such gases gets released in the air and stink gets higher. For mitigating the smell, we have taken various plans. We also have a sanitising procedure to reduce the smell.”
“The capacity of the plant is to treat 500 tonnes of solid waste whereas the city produces almost five thousand tonnes of mixed waste. Even with all the seven plants it’s not possible to treat it completely,” She later added.
A study conducted by the Solid Waste Management Overview by BBMP shows that the city produces more than3000-3500 tonnes of solid waste daily. To deal with this growing garbage problem of the city, seven Solid Waste Management plants were established. Out of which, Chikkanagamangala has the processing capacity of 500 metric tonnes and all seven plants can together process 2350 tonnes.
Mr. Akshay Heblikar, Environmentalist, Eco Watch said, “As all the waste from the city comes to these seven plants it is obvious that it will produce stink. But some steps should be taken for that. The plants should be away from the residential area. Other than that plants should be sprayed with bacterial culture which helps to reduce the smell.”
