Alternative site for Howrah dumping yard identified: DM
Times of India | 26 May 2025
123 Kolkata: Two months after the Belgachhia dump yard disaster in Howrah—and 22 years after the Calcutta High Court first directed the authorities to find an alternative dumping site—the longstanding civic menace of massive garbage overflow in Howrah seems close to a resolution.A detailed affidavit the Howrah DM has submitted to NGT, outlining a comprehensive roadmap for waste management, says a suitable location has been identified for the dumping ground.Although the affidavit, filed last week, does not name the site, environmentalists in the city believe govt and local administration are keen on preventing a recurrence of the March 21 disaster at Belgachhia, where the piled-up waste led to landslide, damaging roads and houses. They hope the alternative site would provide a permanent solution to the crisis at the current site, a 100-acre plot that houses trash towering over 150 metres.Acting on a report published in TOI, the tribunal had taken up the matter suo motu. An urgent follow-up hearing of the case has now been slated for May 29."It was in 2003 that the HC first issued an order to find an alternative site for the dumping ground. In 2008, it reiterated the directive. The municipal area has witnessed massive expansion over the past 22 years, and nearly half of the original dumping ground land has been encroached upon. Identifying an alternative site has become extremely urgent. Since a suitable location has finally been found, we hope this will lead to a permanent solution to the problem," said green activist Subhas Datta, a Howrah resident who has been relentlessly working on the cause for three decades.Howrah district magistrate P Deepap Priya has said in the affidavit that soon after the Belgachhia subsidence, the administration initiated large-scale bio-mining and bioremediation to tackle the massive legacy waste pile. HMC also rolled out door-to-door segregated waste collection in 25 wards, hoping to reduce the volume of waste reaching the landfill, stated the affidavit.