NDMC to charge for garbage collection

New Delhi: The North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) is planning to impose user charge from waste generators for door-to-door collection of municipal solid waste in its area.

Following the ‘Solid Waste Management Rules’ notified by Union ministry of environment, forest and climate change, a proposal was placed before the NDMC’s House on Monday. The House referred back the proposal. However, officials said that it is the Union government’s direction to impose user charge on waste generators and that it will be implemented later on.

The Solid Waste Management Rules 2016 says that waste generators shall pay fee to the user for solid waste management as specified in the bye-laws of the local bodies. On May 13, 2016, NDMC’s commissioner also approved implementation of Solid Waste Rules 2016. Sources said that the proposal was once again moved through the Standing Committee for approval before being placed in the House. The NDMC claimed that 100 per cent door-to-door collection is not possible under the present budgetary allocation. “The department may not be in a position to make budgetary provision for door to door collection unless user charges, as envisaged in the ‘Solid Waste Management Rules’ and ‘Swachchh Bharat Mission,’ are recovered from every household, commercial establishment, hotel, restaurant, office, small scale industries, godown, cold storage, marriage halls, party halls, community centres, malls and exhibition halls,” said a NDMC official. The proposal suggested levying user charges for different types of users based on the category of the colonies as envisaged in property tax classification. Current proposal suggested higher charges for higher classification category of properties and lower for lower classification category of properties. Existing proposal suggested highest user charge of Rs 150 per month for properties in category A colonies and lowest of Rs 50 for category H colonies. For non-residential or commercial units, it proposes a minimum of Rs 200 to a maximum of Rs 30,000 depending on the category or colonies and the nature of establishment.