Bhubaneswar, Aug 20: The meeting between Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) and villagers held on Friday over the Bhuasuni landfill issue ended inconclusively despite the lucrative offer from the civic body to construct a park with an investment of Rs 103 crore.
BMC Mayor Sulochana Das and Commissioner Vijay Amruta Kulange attended the meeting called by the villagers at the Jagruti Mahila Samiti conference hall.
Villagers and local leaders have asked the BMC not to dump garbage in the Bhuasuni landfill and demanded immediate bio-extraction of the waste dumped there. Daruthenga panchayat sarpanch handed a memorandum in this regard to the mayor.
The mayor called on the villagers to forget the past and cooperate with the civic body with the promise to gradually turn garbage into compost through bio-extraction. Also, she has proposed to build a park in the area with an investment of Rs 103 crore.
Commissioner Vijay Amruta Kulange also presented a digital presentation of BMC’s planning for the development of the area, but to no avail.
Villagers and local leaders were slow to come to a decision on this after a gram sabha.
Villagers stopped garbage trucks from entering Daruthenga landfill after a lorry loaded with rubbish hit a village youth earlier this month who succumbed to his injuries while undergoing treatment.
Angered by the crash, residents blocked garbage trucks from entering the landfill for about two weeks.
Notably, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) was dumping garbage from 100 trucks in the Bhuasuni landfill. But, after the accident, trucks dump waste at the temporary transit center (TTC) near the Sainik school.
Due to excessive dumping of waste at the TTC beyond its boundary, its surrounding wall adjoining the Sainik School collapsed.