Govt to set up a company to exclusively handle Bengaluru's garbage

This new body will be independent of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP).
Bengaluru garbage piling up on the streets
Bengaluru garbage piling up on the streets
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The Karnataka cabinet on Wednesday decided to set up a state run company — Bengaluru Solid Waste Management Limited — to handle the city's garbage disposal problem, Law and Parliamentary affairs Minister Basvaraj Bommai said. Interacting with media persons after the cabinet meeting, Bommai said that both Karnataka government and the Bengaluru civic body will be partners with the latter having 51% stakes, while the state government will have 49% stakes in the new entity.

"The new company will be headed by the Additional Chief Secretary. The company will be independent from the Bengaluru civic body, which will be sole responsible for handling garbage related issues in the city. There has been a long time demand for a financially and administratively independent body to take care of solid waste management," he explained.

He added that the BJP had assured in its manifesto that it will find a permanent solution to tackle the garbage problem. "In the wake of Bengaluru’s civic body unable to focus on handling garbage, the state came out with this idea of setting up an exclusive unit, which will be responsible for not only handling garbage but also incharge of waste to energy plants too," he said.

The country's third most populous city, Bengaluru generates 5,500 metric ton of garbage daily and 4,000 metric ton is generated from household waste alone, while the remaining is produced from companies and other units.

The story of Bengaluru’s garbage mess is not new. Despite multiple warnings from the Karnataka High Court over the waste management issue, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) had failed to issue separate tenders for wet and dry waste collection from households. 

After detailed deliberations, it had gone for a model where wet waste and dry waste are collected in two separate compartments of the same vehicle but this has not solved the problem.

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