The mayor and the commissioner of north Delhi visited the Bhalswa landfill site Tuesday with the civic body announcing a slew of measures that it will take for its remediation, even as parts of the over 60 meter-high garbage dump continued to smoulder, officials said.
Mayor Adesh Gupta, accompanied by Municipal Commissioner Madhup Vyas, Engineer-in-Chief Vijay Prakash, and other senior officials of the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) and senior police officer, visited the site in the afternoon for about 30 minutes and took stock of the situation.
The Bhalswa landfill site falls under the jurisdiction of the NDMC. The massive garbage heap had got saturated several years ago.
"Three immediate major decisions were taken, which included reinforcement of the barbed wire, deployment of a police team to restrict entry of ragpickers and night vigil by the staff stationed at the site," a senior NDMC official in the engineering department told PTI.
The mayor also decided that a "global tender" would soon be invited for remediation of the Bhalswa landfill site, the official said.
"The Bhalswa landfill site is spread over 70 acres, rising 62 meters. About 2,000 metric tonne of garbage is being dumped on it on a daily basis and currently it has 80 lakh metric tonne of garbage," the mayor was quoted as saying in an NDMC statement.
Gupta also directed officials to expedite the treatment of garbage.
"A consultancy firm has been hired for remediation of the Bhalswa landfill site, which has submitted the initial report on it. The firm has done boring at 28 points of the dump to study the culture of garbage. As per the received report, it is being ascertained that the garbage is 12 meter-deep below the ground," he said.
Gupta said the consultancy firm would be submitting its final report by the end of the year, based on which the NDMC would be releasing a global tender for work on slope stabilisation, leachate (dirty water) treatment, bio-mining (segregation of garbage) and capping at the Bhalswa landfill site.
Fire incidents keep taking place at the humongous site on and off, caused by natural factors or triggered by some incendiary material.
A fire has been raging at the Bhalswa landfill site since October 20, raising concerns about the air quality in the Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR) further deteriorating.
The Delhi Fire Service (DFS) department had on Monday night said the blaze at the site was "almost" brought under control by 7:30 pm.
A senior DFS official, however, Tuesday said parts of the dump site was still smouldering.
Gupta said the NDMC has deployed "its 60 employees, full bulldozers and two excavators at the Bhalswa site to manage and regulate the garbage round-the-clock".
"Also, four fire tenders have been dedicated by the fire department for the site," the mayor said, directing the officials to strengthen the barbed wire fencing to check trespassing by locals.
He also sought help of the city police to ensure compliance, the civic body said.
Delhi's air quality remained in the "poor" category Tuesday, a day after it had improved from the "very poor" Air Quality Index (AQI) zone. But experts have said it may deteriorate in the coming days due to the toxic air emanating from the fire at the Bhalswa landfill site.
Delhi Environment minister Imran Hussain had Monday expressed serious concerns over the fire as the city is already fighting the adverse impact of stubble burning in the neighbouring states.
Hussain directed the three municipal corporations in the national capital to work on preventing incidents of fire at landfill sites.
He also told DFS officials to depute a fire tender exclusively to tackle future fire incidents at the Bhalswa landfill site.
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