B’luru residents clean up road after complaints about garbage ignored

Furious with the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike’s (BBMP) inaction regarding garbage dumping on Kaggadasapura Main Road despite repeated complaints, around 150 residents of CV Raman Nagar and Kaggadasapura on Saturday cleaned up and beautified the area. The BBMP was regularly using a stretch of the road to transfer and segregate waste.

“We started around 8 am in the morning and we cleaned the whole place by 10 am. Then we started painting the walls. There were some of us who stood in protests holding placards,” said Tammana, a resident.

The locals argue that they had to take matters into their own hands because of growing health concerns. Large quantities of garbage remain on the road after garbage collection and dumping vehicles leave the area. On most days, the garbage mounds and the vehicles both remain over a good part of the 300-metre stretch of the highly populated Kaggadasapura Main Road. Residents in the area that there are mounds of hazardous domestic and medical waste, which have been posing serious health concerns to those who live and work in the area.

This drive took place close to a month after 400 residents protested against the authorities regarding the same issue. Before the protest, the Mayor had also promised a permanent solution, but nothing changed on the ground. The residents now are also planning to protest at the BBMP headquarters over the issue, and submit a petition to the Mayor and Commissioner.

Read: B’luru residents stage protest against BBMP for segregating, dumping waste on main road

Abhayahasta Multispeciality Hospital, located in the vicinity, has seen a sharp rise in complaints of skin rashes, respiratory infections, eye infections and insect bites. Hospital authorities say that all affected residents belong to Kaggadasapura, Bhuvaneshwari Nagar, DRDO Quarters and several apartments in the neighbourhood. There has also been a rise in water and air-borne infections like diarrhoea, typhoid, dermatitis and respiratory infections.

Dr Avinash Ashok Sherkane, MBBS, MD and Chairman of Abhayahasta said, “We strongly suspect that this sudden increase in instances of water and air-borne ailments in the neighbourhood is directly related to large amounts of garbage lying in the open on the main road leading to the affected areas and complexes.”

“Not just diseases, we have also had several instances of minor casualty incidents due to two-wheelers skidding on the road in the wee hours of the morning as garbage turns slushy and spills over on the road. The garbage point on the main road is a severe health hazard and must be addressed quickly and efficiently,” he added.

Senior citizen Sampat S, an activist and a long-time resident of Kaggadasapura said, “The new look is far more fitting for the city of gardens than the garbage mounds we have had here for a good part of the last five years. Now we can only hope that BBMP respects our efforts and concerns and allows the area to remain clean and green and most importantly, healthy.”

However, on Saturday, rather than acknowledging the efforts to give the place a facelift, residents say that the local corporator Aruna, her husband Ravi and others have started threatening residents. Some residents are taking turns to ensure that garbage does not come back to the old spot.