This is the second post in this series

2. Clean India - with no dirt/no solid waste anywhere

What is the current position?

At first most people do not segregate waste at home and hence collect and dump all the waste together. Second most houses just put the combined waste in some road corner either in dust bins or just outside in some street corner. This creates unhygienic environment, stink and also presents a poor display of our cities, towns and villages. So at first this is a citizen problem. Secondly in most cases this waste is collected by municipal authorities, transported in trucks or other vehicles and then dumped outside the city or town. This is also a costly affair. I have seen some people just dump waste paper, packets etc. on the road without any thought. So this is a very complex problem but the impact is that places seem dirty. So not a good position to be in. Plus this is not a sustainable way of storing, handling and disposing of waste.

What do we want?

Can we imagine the whole of India which is clean, with no dirt or waste visible anywhere? Just like in many places you may have seen outside India? Is this possible? Yes it is possible. But how?

Clean India - what to do?

This can only be achieved by strong contribution from citizens, society at large and the government/municipal authorities. Second this can be done only with strong decentralized approaches, since the matter needs street level intervention. Third we must segregate waste. This itself can reduce waste significantly. Fourth, decentralized composting must be set up either at houses itself or at ward level etc. What cannot be composted or reused etc. must be handled so that it does not damage the environment. Fifth, large generators of waste must be handled independently and directly by the authorities so that they don't dump the waste on the roads. Education of children can play an important role in this, so is training each house member on how to handle waste. Enforcement is also crucial with heavy fines and other measures. We have to do this to make India clean. This has to be a National Priority.