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Waste is a great barometer of social justice. In her 1966 classic Purity and Danger, anthropologist Mary Douglas pointed out that “dirt is matter out of place.” Matter becomes offensive and undesirable only when found in places where it violates the established order. Scrutinising a society using the lens of waste can offer insights into the status of social justice in that culture.
Chennai is the capital of Tamil Nadu, an Indian state that prides itself on its social justice initiatives. Turning the waste lens on the city can reveal the extent to which its political leadership walks the justice talk. The time is ripe for such an analysis, given the ongoing tussle between residents of North Chennai and the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) over the GCC’s proposal to establish an Integrated Solid Waste Processing Facility (ISWPF) in the Kodungaiyur dumpyard.
Waste is a problem with easy ‘solutions’, especially in deeply unequal cultures. All ‘solutions’ — like dumping, burying, and burning — begin with finding the right place to locate a dump, landfill, or incinerator. Site suitability is often decided on cultural criteria that reflect existing social hierarchies. Techno-legal criteria will be considered only if they align with the established cultural order that, in India, is mediated by the powerful institution of caste.
Chennai has two dumpyards: Kodungaiyur in North Chennai, serving Zones 1 to 8, and South Chennai’s Perungudi dump, catering to Zones 9 to 15. Residents living near both dumps have been demanding their closure for decades.
Perungudi’s worst woes may be nearing an end. The GCC has announced that the yard will no longer receive fresh waste once ongoing biomining operations to reclaim the site are complete. The GCC’s 2022 Clean Air Action Plan justifies this move, noting that “the habitation around the Perungudi dump site has increased in the past 20 years and many prestigious commercial infrastructures got established within 2 km of the periphery.”
This is a reference to Perungudi’s improved status following the establishment of multinational IT companies in the Pallikaranai marshlands. Not just people, economic activities and industries too have fixed places in India’s caste hierarchy. Waste that was once considered acceptable for disposal in a certain location now violates a social order determined by the entry of “prestigious commercial infrastructures.”
Meanwhile, Kodungaiyur’s problems are set to worsen. Unmindful of local protests, including an 8,000-person human chain, the Corporation is moving ahead with plans to continue using the site for waste from the eight zones. Additionally, it will divert incinerable plastic, cloth, and wood waste from all 15 zones to a new incinerator to be built in the dumpyard.
Justifying the move, GCC Commissioner J Kumaragurubaran reportedly said, “We have no choice but incineration. The city's population is growing, and there is no land available to dump such large volumes of waste after the Perungudi dumpyard is reclaimed.”
The commissioner’s statement hides an important nuance. It is not that there is no land in Chennai, but that there is no land deemed suitable to “dump” waste.
What makes Perungudi eligible for reclamation and restoration, and Kodungaiyur suitable to receive the city’s waste? To answer that, one must unravel the criteria — both technical and cultural — used to evaluate site suitability.
The technical criteria are in the Project Information Memorandum (PIM) included in the GCC’s tender notice to bidders. The cultural criteria must be inferred using indicators that shed light on Kodungaiyur’s socio-cultural status within Chennai. For this, I draw on ward-level population details from the 2011 Census, along with zone-wise population and garbage generation data available from other public sources.
Kodungaiyur: Techno-legal suitability
The GCC has identified three plots of land in Kodungaiyur for a new waste facility. These are called Site 1 (50.01 acres), Site 2 (15.49 acres), and Site 3 (9.30 acres). Since the sites are not next to each other, the project will need 3km of new roads — including over waterbodies — to connect them before handover to the successful bidder. This construction will be paid for with public money.
The different parts of the waste facility must follow certain mandatory distance rules, or “setbacks,” listed in a government manual called the CPHEEO manual, which is referred to in the project’s tender document (PIM). The key rules are:
> Incinerators must be at least 500 metres away from where people live.
> Other waste processing units must be at least 200 metres from homes.
> All facilities must be 200 metres away from waterbodies like lakes and ponds.
> Facilities must not be located within flood-prone areas.
Additionally, numerous High Court orders prohibit the conversion of wetlands and waterbodies for any purpose.
Site 1: According to Table 24 in the PIM, Site 1 has been marked as suitable for the incinerator. This is despite the site falling in a flood prone area, and failing the habitation setback criteria. Vinoba Nagar of New Washermanpet is less than 300 metres from the site boundary.
Site 2: This densely wooded area interspersed with waterbodies is identified as the site for the bio-CNG plant. Figure 31 in the PIM (see below) notes that waterbodies occupy 2.88 acres of the site. Despite this, the site has been declared suitable.
Site 3: This site is a waterbody. Figure 43 in the PIM labels 5.18 acres — 56% of the total area — as “Waterbodies.” It is lying adjacent to a Chennai Metrowater supply well. Still, the site is being planned for a composting facility.
The GCC, however, reassures bidders that the “existing site contours shall change after the site development work (earth filling),” which suggests the waterbodies will simply be filled in and turned into land.
By the GCC’s own admission, the Kodungaiyur sites fail multiple legal and environmental criteria. Why then would GCC insist on locating a toxic facility in a densely populated region where open wooded spaces and waterbodies are at a premium? The answer lies in the cultural criteria.
Waste and caste
Waste tends to move from places with political agency to those with less. In India, caste and class determine which places are considered high, and which low. In a caste society, waste and discards are seen as impure and polluting, and handling them is deemed the work of ‘impure’ or ‘polluted’ castes.
To adapt Mary Douglas’ observation that dirt is “matter out of place,” a society’s cultural values determine where waste belongs. These values designate certain areas out of bounds for it, and others as acceptable homes for impure discards.
SC population here is used as an indicator of the relative marginalisation of residents in various parts of the city.
It is unfortunate that we neither have more recent census data, nor more granular caste-based data that would reveal the true extent of environmental and developmental casteism in India.
Importantly, the low SC population in wards such as Kodungaiyur East (Ward 1) and RK Nagar (Ward 3) does not indicate privilege. The remaining population is likely to comprise Most Backward Classes (MBCs) or Other Backward Classes (OBCs). A caste-wise census would likely show the absence or insignificance of dominant castes in the area.
Of Chennai’s total population, SCs make up 16.82%. At 23.8% (refer Table 1), the wards closest to the dumpsite/proposed ISWPF have significantly higher-than-average SC population. In contrast, elite wards have a significantly lower-than-average SC population, at just 9.1% (Table 2).
This supports the proposition that waste in Chennai flows along a caste gradient — towards areas with higher-than-average SC populations — even when those areas contribute far less waste than the zones inhabited by class and caste elites.
Area data for the table above has been sourced from qGIS by K Saravanan, and other data from GCC, as cited in Citizen Matters.
Kodungaiyur falls within Zone 4 (Tondiarpet), which has a per capita waste generation of 0.86 kg/person/day (Slide 1 for Table 3). This is below the city average of 0.9 kg/day. By contrast, Zones 12 (Alandur), 13 (Adyar), 14 (Perungudi), and 15 (Sholinganallur) generate significantly more waste: 0.97, 0.97, 1.1 and 1.25 kg/person/day (Slide 3 for Table 3).
Population density offers insight into the availability of open space. Tondiarpet is among the most densely populated areas, with 33,700 people per sq km — far above the city average of 20,403. Adyar, with 13,728 people per sq km, boasts the largest area and green cover. Perungudi and Sholinganallur, home to Chennai’s IT corridor, are among the least densely populated zones, with just 6,746 and 4,663 persons per sq km, respectively.
Predictably, incinerable waste (particularly plastics) from Zones 9 to 15 accounts for 26.4% of total waste, compared with just 19.3% from Zones 1 to 8, according to the PIM.
Discrimination is apparent even in the allocation of conservancy workers. Tondiarpet has just 2.28 workers per 1,000 residents, while Adyar, Perungudi, and Sholinganallur have 3.38, 5.4, and 5.98 workers per 1,000 — well above the city average of 3.27.
In June 2010, I attended a controversial public hearing held by the Corporation for a similar project in Kodungaiyur, where ruling party goons physically prevented residents from speaking. The Mayor had illegally occupied the dais — reserved solely for the Chair (District Collector) and Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) representative.
I recall the collective outrage at the Mayor’s remark that, just as every house needs a toilet, a city too needs a place for its wastes. From 2010 to the present day, the Corporation has maintained that the rightful place for Chennai’s garbage is Kodungaiyur.
Socially just alternatives
Incinerators are a bad idea. Much has already been written about their polluting effects. But it is not the fear of chemical pollution from the incinerator that has prompted the GCC to locate it in Kodungaiyur. It is the abhorrence of the ritual pollution that wastes represent in our caste-riven society.
Centralised incinerators are both environmentally unsustainable and socially unjust. They worsen the harms caused by waste, imposing both ritual and chemical pollution on already burdened communities to benefit others.
If Chennai truly internalised the ideals of social justice that Tamil Nadu so often invokes, it would explore alternatives that at the very least distribute the harms of waste more fairly, even if they do not eliminate them altogether.
If the GCC genuinely believes its facility can operate without toxic emissions, and that any violations would be addressed by the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB), and if the state government is serious about upholding the ideals of social justice, then it should consider the two alternatives presented below.
Both sites are in Zone 13, and lie between 350 metres and 1.3 km from the TNPCB’s headquarters. The high visibility of the location, and the political agency of Zone 13’s elite, would ensure transparent and accountable operation of the facility.
These sites are also much closer to Zones 9 to 15, the city’s main generators of incinerable and plastic waste. Thus, vehicular transport emissions can also be minimised.
Alternative Site 1: Golf Course, Saidapet
The golf course spans 80.4 acres of contiguous government land. The joint lease — held by the Tamil Nadu Golf Federation and the Cosmopolitan Club — is set to lapse on June 30, 2026. Golf serves no public purpose. The site is well connected via Anna Salai. If a decision on the lease has not been taken, the government should refuse renewal and use these lands for public good.
Alternative Site 2: Race Course, Guindy
The 148-acre site of the former race course, previously leased to the Madras Race Club, was taken back by the state government for non-payment of rent. Of this, 118 acres have been allocated to the Horticulture department for development as an eco-park. This is a laudable initiative. However, South Chennai already has ample green spaces — Semmozhi Poonga, Tholkappiyar Poonga, Guindy National Park, Pallikaranai Ramsar site, and the Theosophical Society Gardens. Social justice would be better served, and decades of insult to local communities compensated for, if the eco-park were to be in Kodungaiyur and the incinerator in Guindy.
A third alternative is Island Grounds, which offers the additional advantage of being close to both the Madras High Court and the Secretariat. If this becomes the site for the ISWPF, the golf course could be repurposed as fairgrounds, and both the race course and Kodungaiyur dumpyard could be transformed into eco-parks.
Nityanand is a writer and social activist. Views expressed are the author’s own.