The Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) will soon issue notification prohibiting distribution of plastic carry bags free of cost to the customers within Guwahati Municipal area. “Minimum price of carry bags depending upon their quality and size will be charged as and when the notification is issued by the Corporation,” an official statement said.

‘It is necessary to ban the use of plastic bags in the city, which pose serious threat to people’s health and result in choked drains, artificial floods, etc.’

GUWAHATI: The Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) has decided to ban the use of polythene bags in the city from next month. The GMC officials said that it is necessary to ban the use of plastic bags in the city, which pose serious threat to people’s health and result in choked drains, artificial floods, etc.

JAIPUR: When the state government is gearing up to promote the technology to produce fuel out of wastes, a similar arrangement in the city is failing due to alleged sapathy of Jaipur Municipal Corporation (JMC) in providing solid waste to one of the private companies which has set up its plant here.

A private player has established an industry to process municipal solid waste on the outskirts of Jaipur to generate 130-140 tons of refuse derived fuel (RDF) out of 400-500 tons of waste per day.

Once a source of fresh water for irrigation, Kadaperi lake is now rapidly degrading

Due to unchecked pollution, abetted by government agencies, a sprawling water body in Tambaram is under siege. The Kadaperi Lake in West Tambaram, has fallen a victim to pollution caused by unchecked discharge of grey water and sullage from homes and commercial establishments, as well as effluents from the Tambaram Depot of the Metropolitan Transport Corporation.

Middlemen identify landowners and pay them to get consent

About a week ago, the residents of villages in Anamalai Panchayat Union that border Kerala got hold of four lorries that were about to dump wastes alongside roads and in farms. They took up the issue with the district authorities and this led the Anamalai police to register a case.

Collector's order backs hospital's efforts

Efforts of the Government Medical College Hospital authorities to keep the premises clean and litter-free have received a fillip with the District Collector stepping in to declare the premises a ‘plastic-free zone'. The official declaration to this effect was issued recently.

GUWAHATI: Use of plastic bags and other plastic materials will be banned in Guwahati from June 5. The Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) is on a mission, a mission to make Guwahati a plastic-free city from June 5. Defaulters will be heavily fined and punished, said a GMC official.

However, this is not the first time that GMC has declared a ban on plastic. On previous occasions when the ban was imposed, people obeyed the rules only for a few days and then again switched back to using plastic bags, plastic cups etc.

UN report rates Mumbai, Kolkata as below average

Three big cities — Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore — have been rated below average compared to other mega cities in Asia-Pacific in terms of keeping pollution levels in check, said a report of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Delhi is the only Indian city featured in the average category. The Asia-Pacific Human Development Report 2012 titled One Planet to Share: Sustaining Human Progress in a Changing Climate today came out with a green ranking of 22 cities in the Asia-Pacific

The vast swirl of plastic waste floating in the North Pacific has grown 100-fold over the last 40 years, according to a research paper published Wednesday.
And scientists warned the killer soup of microplastic — particles smaller than five millimetres – threatened to alter the open ocean’s natural environment.
In the period 1972 to 1987, no microplastic was found in the majority of samples taken for testing, said the paper in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.

Waste Management: With no “proper place” designated for the community to dump solid waste, some frustrated residents of Khasadrapchu dug a garbage pit by the riverside six years ago.

Located below the road that leads to the Gidakom hospital, the landfill is not fenced nor missed by passersby or stray dogs. One can see that the wind has blown some into the river, while papers and plastics cling on to the bare branches.