Garbage dumping at public places has become a major concern as the civic body is looking to improve the ranking of Nagpur in upcoming ‘Swachh Sarvekshan’. To curb garbage dumping at public places, the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) has collected a whopping fine of Rs 1.91 crore in last three years from citizens but the situation has more or less remained the same even after poor performance by Nagpur in ‘Swachh Sarvekshan’ in last three years. Solid waste mitigation has become a tough task for NMC and for this, every stakeholder has to come forward to make city clean and garbage free.

 

 

According to a reply by NMC in a Right To Information (RTI) application filed by RTI activist Abhay Kolarkar, NMC took action against 35,245 people throughout the city for garbage dumping in public places from January 1, 2022 to August 28, 2024. NMC also collected a fine of Rs 1.91 crore from the offenders. Laxmi Nagar Zone, which comes under the Assembly constituency of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, recorded the highest 9,940 number of garbage dumping cases in city and the civic body collected the highest fine of Rs 48.68 lakh from the same zone.

 

Similarly, NMC collected the second highest amount of fine of Rs 33.52 lakh from Dharampeth Zone which comes under the Nagpur West constituency of Congress Party’s Vikas Thakre. In Dharampeth, NMC registered 3,383 garbage dumping cases in last three years. After Laxmi Nagar Zone, the civic body registered 6,818 number of cases in Mangalwari Zone which was the second highest number of cases in city. NMC collected a fine of Rs 32.39 lakh from Mangalwari Zone since 2022.

 

NMC collected fines from shopkeepers, pan kiosk owners, food stalls owner, meat sellers, fruit vendors, vegetable vendors, residents etc for dumping garbage on road sides, public places, burning garbage, polluting water bodies, dumping garbage on open plots etc. For these civic offences, NMC collected fines between Rs 100 to 2,000 from citizens. To score better ranking in ‘Swachh Sarvekshan’, the civic body and citizens both have to work together and better cleanliness awareness among masses is needed and NMC has to think in this regard, said RTI activist Kolarkar.