Denizens actively help in garbage collection

Hyderabad: The awareness campaign on cleanliness launched by a team of NGOs in the recent years on Bakrid has proved to be fruitful in terms of reduced workload on the Civic body, which worked in tandem with the city-based NGOs in close coordination of police department.

Compared to last year, most of the garbage collection effort was much streamlined this year and was less cumbersome as most of the denizens adhered to the GHMC norms by dumping the disposals directly in the garbage containers in their areas.

The impact of the coordinated effort was so much so that the GHMC commissioner, Dana Kishore on Monday hoped that with the idea of coordinating with NGOs can help streamline managing of the big festivities. He tweeted, "Shall moot it in tomorrow's coordination meeting on Ganesh Nimajjanam…. I am sure Hyderabadi's will respond positively. It can also gain major traction if spread by 30 NGOs working on Saaf Hyderabad & Shaandaar Hyderabad…"

Speaking to The Hans India, Ilyas Shamshi, the promoter of this cleanliness campaign, said that this campaign which was initiated by the coordinated effort of the Team NGOs reached its fruition, as compared to the previous years there were very few locations across the city where garbage pile-up was witnessed.

"Last year volunteers had to stay on the field past midnight, but on Monday most of them returned to celebrate Eid by dusk, by finishing off most of the work. One of the major aspects that eased this garbage problem was awareness amongst the Muslim community over the issue and distribution of black bags amongst residents with more efficiency. Most of those who sacrificed animals were seen willingly disposing of the wastage by visiting nearby garbage collection point," he said.

On Monday, there were around 400 hundred volunteers affiliated to different NGOs who took part in the Team effort. Besides GHMC's big vehicles like tippers and machinery like JCB in place, some of the good Samaritans also volunteered to offer smaller vehicles for three days (sacrifices can be conducted for three days starting from Eid).

"There was much better coordination between GHMC and police officials in this endeavour and the Team NGOs efforts through decentralisation also proved fruitful," he added. Saber Yamani, convener of Hyderabad chapter of Team NGOs, said that volunteers remained for hours on field, while braving the rain showers. "This year proved to be a reliever for most of those who have been working hard from the beginning of this campaign," he noted.