Thiruvananthapuram: The city corporation has drawn up an initial plan to keep Amayizhanjan Canal free from plastic waste. As part of this, the civic body is set to install five trash booms in the canal that passes through the seven wards of the corporation. The trash booms are a quick and simple solution to passively stop floating waste in canals at a designated area.
It is mainly to collect the plastic waste that are being dumped into the canal. The trash booms will be installed with the help of NGOs . The corporation sanitation workers will collect the trash daily from a platform that will be placed near the trash boom so that they do not have to get down into the canal.
Once the trash booms are deployed successfully, the corporation would focus next on the enforcement part to prevent dumping of waste in the canal that meanders through the heart of the city. “The next plan is to intensify the enforcement part. The day and night squads under the health wing will be on the job round-the-clock to nab those who dump waste into the canal.
In addition, the corporation has also installed CCTV cameras at various places near the canal, and there will be round-the-clock surveillance from the centralised facility of the integrated control and command centre (ICCC),” corporation authorities said. Gayathri Babu, health standing committee chairperson, told TOI that installation of trash booms will commence soon with the help of various NGOs, and it will be done using the fund of corporate environment responsibility (CER) of various companies functioning in the state capital. “The trash boom installation is the immediate measure to collect waste.
We will install five trash booms at various locations of the canal. If any plastic waste is found, it will be collected in the net attached to the trash boom. That will be collected by the sanitation workers, and it will be sent to the agencies for recycling,” she said.
Recently, people’s committees were constituted by the corporation in the seven wards where the Amayizhanjan Canal passes through. These committees were formed based on the chief minister's directive as part of the efforts to protect the Amayizhanjan Canal. As part of it, the LSG minister M B Rajesh launched the Thampanoor people’s committee this week.
However, the opposition raised apprehension that the opposition councillors should also be included in the committee to ensure the transparency of the cleaning activities..
