31 July,2018 07:31 AM IST | Mumbai | Laxman Singh
Mulund dumping ground will be the first in city to be closed. File pic
BMC will finally shut Mulund dumping ground this October. It has appointed a contractor to start the reclamation of land in one of city's biggest dumping grounds, spread across 24-odd hectares.
A senior civic official from the Solid Waste Management department said, "From October 1, dumping of waste at Mulund will be stopped. Recently, BMC issued a Letter of Intent to the contractor to start the work. The process of land reclamation includes biomining and systematic disposal of waste to some other location. Currently, Mulund gets 2,000 metric tons of waste daily. Once shut, this quantity will be diverted to Deonar and Kanjurmarg dumping grounds."
'Reached full capacity'
The official added, "The Mulund ground reached its full capacity long back. Several plans were made and a contract awarded to close it, but it did not yield results. Finally, the time has come... it will be the first city dumping ground to be shut."
In June, BMC had awarded a contract of Rs 731 crore for six years to reclaim land at the dumping ground in a phase-wise manner. According to the data available with the civic body, about 70 lakh metric tons of garbage will be cleared from the dumping ground.
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Consortium gets contract
Earlier, BMC had failed to get a response from contractors on this project, and they had to re-invite the tenders three times. "In November 2015, October 2016 and March 2017, the civic body had issued tenders to shut down the dumping ground and reclaim the land. But we failed to get a good response, and all three times, the tender had to be scrapped. However, the fourth tender, which was floated in February, got a response, and the consortium of Prakash Constrowell Ltd, Infotech International Ltd and EB Enviro Biotech Pvt Ltd was awarded the contract."
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