The fire at the dumping ground in Kochi’s Brahmapuram waste treatment plant has been doused 11 days after it started on March 2, leaving a blanket of toxic haze over the commercial hub of Kerala.
Ernakulam District Collector N S K Umesh said the fire was put out completely on Monday evening and the quality of air had improved in the region.
“However, we would maintain an utmost vigil in the region for the next 48 hours as there are chances of re-ignition. All government employees and volunteers who took part in the firefighting mission at the plant would undergo a detailed medical check-up on Tuesday at a special camp. They would be given psychological support with follow-up programmes,” he said.
The Kerala High Court, meanwhile, has directed the Kochi Municipal Corporation to furnish expenditure details on waste management in the last seven years. A Division Bench of Justice S V Bhatti and Basant Balaji, which is considering a suo motu case with regard to the fire at the dumping yard, on Monday directed the municipal corporation secretary to “place before the court on Tuesday all payments made by KMC under the heads of collection, transportation, handing over, treatment etc. for the past seven years to contractors or staff under any head”.
The corporation has also been asked to explain the contract which allowed “a free hand to a third party over the responsibility of the Brahmapuram waste treatment plant”.
Even as the fire and the smoke subsided in Kochi, heated exchanges were witnessed in the state Assembly where the ruling CPI(M) and the Opposition Congress blamed each other for the situation.
Seeking a CBI probe into the fire incident, the Congress-led Opposition said the garbage was “deliberately set on fire” to help the firm, Zonta Infratech, which was given the task of bio-mining at the dumping yard.
Leader of the Opposition V D Satheesan said the company, which was picked up by the government to clear the garbage, realised that an inspection from the government would expose its failure to shift the waste. “Hence, the garbage was deliberately set on fire,’’ he said.
Countering the allegations, Local Self Government Department Minister M B Rajesh told the Assembly that the state government had effectively intervened in the issue and blamed the United Democratic Front (UDF) for “mismanagement” at the waste treatment plant.
“When the UDF was ruling the Kochi corporation (from 2010 to 2020), there had been fire incidents at Brahmapuram. In 2015, the municipal corporation handed over the waste management to the state government, which in 2018 decided to start a project for generating energy from waste. But, the UDF-led council did not take any steps to make the project a reality. Hence, the government had to engage a new contractor for bio-mining with a deadline of June this year,” said the minister.
He said it should be seriously looked into how waste management in Kochi, which had bagged the central government’s award for the best zero waste city in 2009, has reached this “sorry state”. “During the UDF regimes at the Kochi corporation from 2010 to 2020, the waste management project had been delayed. The sewage treatment plant, which was started in 2008, was functioning well till 2010 when the LDF was in power from 2005 to 2010,’’ Rajesh said.
The Minister said the UDF regimes at the corporation “failed to maintain the garbage plant”. “Subsequently, a large quantity of inorganic waste piled up at Brahmapuram and grew to around 5 lakh tonnes. The present municipal corporation was trying its best to process and remove the garbage, which caught fire,” he said.
Satheesan alleged that the minister was speaking on behalf of the contractor firm. “Was there any probe into the fire at the garbage hill. The minister is justifying the contractors only to protect the interest of certain quarters,’’ he alleged.
The Opposition leader also blamed Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who holds the portfolios of environment and Pollution Control Board, for the fire. “The chief minister is holding these portfolios but he has not uttered a word in the Assembly. (This is) Because he had allowed the partymen to loot the exchequer,” he said.
Zonta Infratech Private Limited, which has taken up waste management at Brahmapuram, in a release said its work was only to rehabilitate legacy waste adopting bio-mining and capping mechanisms. It said the firm had complied with all terms and conditions of the contract agreement with the Kochi corporation. The work did not include management of daily garbage or recycling of plastic waste, it said.
