German attempts to clean the city

When Myriam Shankar found litter on the streets leading to her house, she didn’t hesitate to pick it up and throw it in her garden dustbin. And when her morning walks opened her eyes to the world of garbage in her neighbourhood, she happily picked up the broom and swept the place clean. “I just like a clean environment,” says the German lady who is settled in India.Now she, along with her husband Ajesh Kumar Shankar are actively working towards creating a cleaner city through their many initiatives, especially though Solid Waste Management Round Table (SWMRT) that she set up in October 2009 bringing together individuals and organisations that work towards building awareness about waste management at houses, flats, schools and colleges, and offices across the city. The SWMRT has documented working models for managing waste, and their latest venture is to work towards decentralised waste management through building dry waste collection centres across the city. This Friday, they will present their proposal to BBMP at the Lok Adalat. But this is how the idea began. A year and a half ago, SWMRT’s garbage collection drive saw phenomenal response from the residents of apartments across the city. “Now 22,000 people in apartments manage their waste on their own,” says Myriam. They segregate the waste at the source and sell it to recyclers. “We realise that once people know how to go about it, they will do it,” notes Myriam. “People from apartments can work together and ensure that the garbage is segregated. But then we wondered what people from independent houses would do if they wanted to adopt the same. That’s where the idea of dry waste collection centres can work,” she adds. Currently, pilot projects are running in three places in the city, including Koramangala and Malleswaram.  “What people do is, bring their waste to the collection centre. From there, it is given for recycling. It’s still in the initial stages though,” she says. But what about wet waste? “Once the dry waste is segregated, what is remaining is the wet waste. But we will think about what to do with the wet waste in Phase II,” explains Myriam.But Myriam has experience working with wet waste too. Their proposal to the BBMP to implement wet waste management system in City Market has been successfully implemented. “We are looking at Russell market and other markets too,” she says.