KMC plans spl clean-up drive
Kolkata: The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) is set to launch a week-long cleanliness drive across the city based on feedback from citizens. Mayor Firhad Hakim said on Friday that the KMC solid waste management teams, organised borough-wise, were ready to respond to calls from citizens across 144 wards and would be able to dispose of garbage within four hours of receiving a complaint.
The drive, which will begin on May 28, may be extended depending on citizens' response, Hakim said.
All a citizen needs to do is take a photo of the garbage accumulating in their neighbourhood, or elsewhere in the city, and send it via WhatsApp to 9073367883. "As soon as we get a complaint, it will be communicated to our workers in the boroughs, and a team will set out for the spot. We are confident that within four hours, the area will be cleaned," said Debabrata Majumdar, MMiC overseeing the KMC solid waste management department.
According to a civic official, the decision to conduct the drive was made after getting complaints from citizens about the piling up of garbage. Hakim conceded that in some city areas, garbage was accumulating even after the civic body's clean-up drive twice a day. "Garbage is being dumped on the roadside by contractors assigned by the residents of high-rises to collect garbage from the complexes. In some markets, garbage is dumped by the traders even after collection by our team of workers.
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In such cases, we will need to get feedback from the citizens so that these areas are cleaned during a special drive," he said.
The solid waste management department officials will need to focus on markets, the trading hub in Burrabazar, the CBD area, railway stations, and areas located off EM Bypass, said a KMC official.
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