Gurugram’s sanitation crisis under HC scanner

After sharp criticism by the National Green Tribunal (NGT), poor civic amenities in Gurugram city have now come under the scanner of the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

The HC has appointed 19 local commissioners who will visit various parts of the city, assigned to them by the court, on January 2 and January 3 next year to assess the ground situation on sanitation condition and prepare detailed reports. The reports will be submitted to the judicial committee, constituted by the High Court, by January 24.

The chairman of the judicial committee, Inderjit Singh (retd), District and Sessions Judge, and a member, advocate Jigyasa Tanwar, will then compile a concise the report and submit it before the HC by February 17, the next date of hearing in this case.

Pankaj Yadav, a local resident, had filed a petition in the HC against the State of Haryana and the Municipal Corporation, Gurugram, over poor sanitary conditions in the Millennium City, demanding a sustainable solution to this problem.

The HC sought a detailed information from the MCG regarding garbage collection and segregation. The MC provided the data, but it was deemed insufficient and misleading.

The MC claimed to have deployed 3,025 sanitation workers and 470 vehicles for garbage collection, with garbage collected at 23 designated points. However, the court was not satisfied with the reply of the civic body.

“There had been a jugglery of statistics given by the respondents (MCG) only to pat their own back about the purported works undertaken by them towards timely removal of garbage and solid waste generated in the city through different agencies,” the court observed.

Not satisfied with the MCG reply, the HC imposed a fine of Rs 50,000 on the MCG for filing unnecessary documents and not addressing the core issues.

The fine is to be deposited with the District Legal Services Authority, Gurugram, the HC ordered, adding that in case the amount was not deposited, it would be deducted from the salary of the Additional Commissioner, MC, Gurugram.

The HC order further states, “If the reports of the local commissioners indicate poor garbage collection, penalties will be imposed on contractors and nodal officers. Contractors will face fine of Rs 1 lakh and nodal officers will face a penalty of Rs 10,000”.