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Chief Minister Oommen Chandy has said that the garbage crisis in the State Capital has reached a tipping point necessitating resolute action.
“The State Government is duty-bound to intervene in the matter,” he told newspersons here after a meeting of the Cabinet.
COOPERATION SOUGHT
He promised to ‘proceed to do just that’ and requested cooperation of all concerned since the Government couldn’t afford to delay action any further.
The administration will take care to ensure that public peace is not violated and law and order maintained.
Chandy said that the High Court has slammed the State Government on more than one occasion for its failure to implement its directive in this connection.
Acting on a petition filed by the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation, the High Court had directed the Government to do whatever is needed to resume movement of garbage to a treatment plant in the suburbs.
Attempts to get garbage-laden trucks to move into the plant at Vilappilsala had come to nought after local residents offered stiff resistance.
FLASH POINT
The situation reached a flashpoint on both the occasions, but the strong posse of police did not resort to precipitate action given the presence of a large number of women and children among the protesters.
The entire city is littered with garbage after the City Corporation and the Government failed to find means of disposing it of.
Mounds of garbage in various stages of decay over land and in water have thrown up a potentially grave health hazard.
The city has been reporting outbreaks of life-threatening afflictions ranging from different flavours of dengue fever, rat fever, cholera and diarrhoea.
QUARRY-BOUND
The Chief Minister did not exactly say how the administration planned to execute its plan, but sources said it may not fancy ferrying garbage to the Vilappilsala treatment plant yet again.
Instead, it is likely to be taken to massive quarries in disuse dotting the fringes of the district for being dumped there, the sources added.
Meanwhile, the Cabinet deferred a decision on the issue of capping of LPG cylinders to six for beneficiaries of reticulated supply systems in residential flats.
The Chief Minister said this was not practical and agreed that this has caused a lot of hardship to and resentment among consumers.
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