SC to L-G: You think you are superman...

New Delhi, July 12

As garbage piles up like mountains in three landfill sites at Ghazipur, Okhla and Bhalswa, the Supreme Court on Thursday admonished the Delhi Lt Governor for only holding 25 meetings and not issuing directions to the three municipal bodies to deal with the problem.

“Is the office of the L-G responsible? According to your affidavit, the answer is yes. Then do not bring the Chief Minister into this,” a Bench headed by Justice Madan B Lokur said.

Despite the L-G convening 25 meetings and making field visits, nothing had happened. “In spite of these meetings, there are mountains of dumps,” it said, terming the situation in Delhi “absolutely bizarre”.

Disapproving of the L-G’s attitude of being “a superman” but doing nothing, the Bench noted that one of the dumping sites had almost equaled the height of Qutub Minar. The 65-metre garbage mound at Ghazipur was only 8 metres shorter than the historic Qutub Minar, it commented.

The issue of solid waste management in Delhi was the responsibility of the municipal corporations and the L-G has the authority to issue directions in this regard under the Delhi Municipal Corporation Act. The court sought to know why the L-G has not issued any directions to the municipal bodies.

Terming the ‘state policy on solid waste management strategy’ framed by the L-G’s office as “utopian”, the Bench said perhaps it would be impossible to implement it as the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) and North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) do not have funds to carry out day-to-day affairs.

“We find it rather surprising that due to shortage of funds, parts of Delhi will be converted into dump sites,” said the Bench, which also included Justice Deepak Gupta.

It asked the Gurugram Municipal Commissioner to appear to share his experience in successfully managing solid waste and directed the L-G office to file an affidavit by indicating the steps to deal with the situation by July 16, the next date of hearing. — TNS