Gurgaon: MCG councillors on Monday raised serious concerns over inadequate deployment of vehicles for doorstep waste collection and failure to ensure waste segregation.This comes barely a week after the civic body awarded six-month work orders worth Rs 9.6 crore to four private agencies. The issue was flagged during a review meeting chaired by mayor Raj Rani Malhotra and attended by MCG commissioner Pradeep Dahiya and senior officials. Councillors said that the agencies failed to provide the required number of vehicles despite the work formally commencing. Calling the lapse “serious”, councillors said the shortfall at such an early stage pointed to weak implementation and monitoring. They also highlighted that the waste collection vehicles were not compartmentalised, defeating the purpose of source segregation.“There are multiple wards in the city which are facing the problem of inadequate vehicles being provided by these agencies. This is a new tender and it is not what we expect right at the beginning of the work,” said a councillor, who was present in the meeting, requesting anonymity.For example, in ward number 10, there is a requirement of 12 vehicles to cover the entire area for doorstep waste collection. However, they provided only three vehicles. “There is a gap of nine vehicles. I received complaints from the residents, as waste collection won’t be 100% because of an inadequate number of vehicles. We raised the issue at the meeting today (Monday),” said Mahabir, councillor of ward number 10, adding, “I was given assurance by the MCG officials in the meeting that the problem will be resolved by Thursday.”Another councillor, requesting anonymity, said, “Residents of my ward are educated enough and willing to segregate waste. However, the vehicles that are coming in as part of this new contract do not facilitate segregated waste collection. This is a major problem besides the inadequate waste collection vehicles being provided by the contractor.”The MCG officials, at the meeting, announced that the civic body made it mandatory for the vehicles to be GPS-based and made online monitoring of these vehicles mandatory to track their movement and performance. An online platform will also be developed to enable councillors of respective wards to track vehicle movement and ensure regular collection, officials said.Commissioner Pradeep Dahiya said negligence in waste management would not be tolerated at any level. He added that technology-driven monitoring, clear accountability and enforcement would be used to improve the city’s cleanliness system.Officials clarified that no fee will be charged from residents for door-to-door garbage collection. TOI reported on Jan 9 that residents won’t have to pay user charges for their doorstep waste collection arrangement extending for six months starting from Jan this year.“There is no provision to levy any user charge for garbage collection. Residents should not pay any amount in the name of waste collection,” the mayor said during the meeting.
