A panel formed by the Kerala High Court to inspect the Kochi Corporation’s Brahmapuram dumping yard has found that there are no adequate facilities for waste management, ANI reported on Tuesday.
The panel was formed after a fire broke out at the 110-acre dumping ground on March 2 and took 11 days to be doused. The smoke from the smoldering dump engulfed most parts of Kochi, leaving a blanket of toxic haze. Residents in the city complained of watery eyes, headaches and breathing difficulties.
Last week, a bench of Justices SV Bhatti and Basant Balaji initiated a case and asked the authorities if had fire broken out due to negligence. Earlier, the judges had observed that the port-city had become a “gas chamber”.
In a report submitted to the High Court on Monday, the inspection committee said the segregation of the legacy waste done at the site was not in accordance with guidelines of the Central Pollution Control Board, PTI reported.
“Not only from Kochi city but also the waste from eight municipalities in the nearby area are brought to Brahmapuram,” the report noted. “But there is not even a place to collect this waste. There is no scientific treatment for plastic waste. There is only one shed in the plant. Therefore, the disposal of these wastes is not done properly.”
The panel also stated that the number of equipment available at the site was not adequate to complete bio-mining – a process by which garbage is treated with bio-organisms or natural elements such as air and sunlight.
“The amount of organic waste delivered to the plant should be reduced,” the report suggested. “None of the guidelines issued by the Central Pollution Board for the disposal of stagnant wastes is followed here. The final product after waste treatment is a very poor quality one. The product obtained after normal waste treatment is given to cement companies. But the cement companies are not accepting the product from here as it is of poor quality.”
The committee also warned that a building at the site was in a dilapidated state and might collapse anytime.
Also read: Kochi’s garbage fire may have been doused, but its ill effects will be felt for a while
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