There was a time some fifteen years ago, the streets in GK used to be swept every day, be that Front or Back Lanes. Gradually the frequency of cleaning reduced to every 2-3 days to a Week and now at times two Weeks. The reason cited is shortage of staff, as many have retired and no new recruitments have been made. While the number of Councillors had risen from 136 to 272 to now 250, these worthies are now housed in a swanky skyscraper on Dr. S.P. Marg.
GK-I is a category B colony and reputed to be among the poshest address in Delhi, a peek into the service lanes belies that image. There are heaps of garbage, malba, foot long weeds shows that regular sweeping is not carried out. It is not just shortage of staff alone at fault, after brooming the garbage heap left in mounds to be collected later in Tipper trucks, acute shortage of which is again to be blamed.
Where is the money collected by way of Property Tax going, Staff strength is half, there is shortage of tipper trucks, miss-management seems the only reason. Whenever complaints are made to Councillor a team of Municipal Labour used to come and cleans up all the lanes in a day. But off late the team strength has dropped to Two or Three labour that manages to clean just one lane in a day. By the time they finish cleaning the entire Block, the first lane the swept is dirty filthy again in absence of daily cleaning.
Such rapid pile up of garbage says a thing or two about the residents too, after all where the garbage come from if not from within homes. It is easy to blame builder site having labour staying overnight and the MCD, but we need to look within, of course MCD too needs to pull up its socks.
by Rajiv Kakria (9810275168)
