It's a 4 !!!

For the past year, we Indoreans woke up to the jingle ‘चौका लगायेंगे’. On 20th August, Indore did hit it beyond the boundary, bagging #1 rank in the swachh sarvekshan for the fourth year in a row. The civic corporation had started preparing for this year even before it had finished its work for the previous year’s survey. The citizens of Indore played a significant role in making the city neat and clean. The cleanliness scenario of Indore was changed by improved habits of its people. Information, Education and Communication (IEC) became the key to behaviour change which lies at the foundation of making a success of Swachh Bharat Mission.

Indore beat 4241 other cities and clinched the title by securing 5647.5 marks out of 6000 with the help of the following methodology. From IEC to Behavioral Change. IMC adopted and undertook a range of Information, Education and Communication activities ranging from traditional to audiovisual to print and electronic media to social/digital media to change the behaviour of different segments of the population and those who associated with different sectors viz. hotel and restaurants, hospitals, industry, etc. Grassroots innovations street plays, Wall paintings, FM radio constantly upgraded its content itself by incorporating new thematic messages to be communicated and utilizing creative ways of undertaking the same. Cultural events such as Ganesh festival, Dussehra, Gandhi Jayanti were utilized as events to spread the swachhata message. An important aspect related to IEC was its integration into monitoring activities. These activities verified (monitored) the current status of service delivery. Verification process took place through different means. These included a) 311 app for service delivery, b) surprise checks through online site visits, c) monitoring staff attendance through biometrics.

100% segregation of waste at the source. Earlier, the households would dump trash in and around big garbage cans at street corners. A privately contracted company would collect the garbage from these points, erratically. Cattle, stray dogs and flies manifested around these dumpsites. But now, waste is segregated at the time of generation itself. Households maintain different dustbins for wet and dry wastes parallelly hospitals and other organisations dump their waste in the respective dustbins. Indore imposed a fine on its citizens if the waste was unsegregated and the cleaning workers refused to collect the waste from the citizens. IT-enabled tracking of waste collection. The IT-enabled control room is created for real-time monitoring of door-to-door waste collection and transportation. GPS has been installed in vehicles to keep track of their transportation activities. If any vehicles dump the waste at an undesignated spot it comes to notice and strict action is taken against them. The computerized facility records the weight of all the dry waste that is being collected by the door to door collection and the bulk collection system along with other details as vehicle in-out time, registration number, source transfer station, etc. NGOs, private enterprises aid waste processing. The collected waste is taken to 10 transfer stations across the city, where staff make sure the waste is properly segregated. From these transfer stations, the waste is taken to the waste processing facility. At the facility, 645 tonnes of recyclable waste is daily sifted through and separated by 300-odd workers. Sarthak and Basix, two NGOs that Indore has collaborated with, have further integrated the informal sector to sort waste, said Sambyal of CSE. The recyclable waste is sold to either the recycling industry or to companies that use recycled material. As much as 550 tonnes of organic waste is produced daily. It is converted to compost which is sold to farmers and landscapers as manure. Sometimes it is given free of charge as farmers agree to transport the compost at their own cost. Non-recyclable waste is sent to a cement plant at Neemuch and to the M.P. Rural Road Development Corporation to be used in the construction of roads, said Sambyal of CSE. This central waste processing facility is built on what used to be Indore’s largest dumping ground. The municipal corporation rented machines to segregate the ‘legacy’ waste and clean the facility up. A part of this cleaned-up dumping ground was planted with trees and is being converted to a park.

Bio-Power A Bioprocessing plant is used to process the 250 tonnes of wet waste which is generated daily and convert it into 1400kg of bio compressed natural gas. This fuel is then used to fuel the city busses which run across the city. This way they are able to provide green fuel and reduce the carbon footprint of public transport. The bio-GNG is expected to be cheaper by Rs 5 as compared to the normal CNG. Therefore, with the use of about 1,000 kg of bio-CNG, there could be a saving of Rs 5,000 on the fuel expenses of these buses. That means there will be a saving of about Rs 1.5 lakh every month. Aye to AI An automated plant processes 1200 tonnes of waste every single day. It uses AI to segregate dry waste. It is the first such facility to be installed in India. Mobile Toilets Mobile toilets have been developed by IMC for use at open area functions and events such as marriages, political gathering, marathons etc. This modular toilet has been made available to the citizen of Indore on chargeable basis. For these mobile toilets, proper cleanliness with adequate water supply as per the SBM guidelines is ensured. Establishment of small composting units. The small composting units have been established to improve solid waste management at the source itself: Khajrana Ganesh & Ranjeet Hanuman temple, school, marriage garden and hotel, and vegetable markets at Rajkumar and Nandlalpura, municipal gardens and parks, Zoo. Decentralised waste treatment. Approximately 20-25 MTPD fruit and vegetable waste are generated daily at Choitram Mandi. Indore Municipal corporation established a decentralized Bio-methanation plant (Bio-CNG Plant) to treat the generated organic waste. All the fruit and vegetable waste generated at Choithram Mandi is being collected and processed in the Bio CNG plant. Approximately 800 kg of purified and compressed Bio CNG having 95% pure Methane gas is generated on a daily basis. The pressurized Bio-CNG gas is used as a fuel to operate approximately 15 city buses. The digested slurry is passed through the solid-liquid separation unit, the filtered liquid is used in slurry making and the remaining solids are dried and converted into organic compost. 3R Creativity Indore reduced over 45mld solid waste through initiatives like utensil bank, jhola bank and disposal free markets.

Zero-Waste Zones A dozen resident colonies are declared ‘Zero waste’ zones as the solid waste which is generated here is segregated and treated on the spot itself. Wet waste is converted into compost, and dry waste is recycled and sold into the market. Over 20,000 households come in these zones.