Tirunelveli has attained the feat of achieving 100% segregation of waste at source across households and establishments.
It involved securing undertakings from each household to segregate biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste, campaigns though TV and local radio channels targeting housewives and roping in religious leaders and NGOs.
The city, with a population of 4.8 lakh, achieved this at a time when other cities are either weighing the risk of failure before starting any initiative or considering imposition of penalties on erring residents.
The Tirunelveli model can be easily adopted by other cities.
Tirunelveli, which has around 1.6 lakh households, took up this challenge in April 2016.
However, an intensive campaign started only on October 2, taking cue from the Solid Waste Management Rules 2016, which make it mandatory for all waste generators to segregate biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste before disposal, and hand over the segregated waste to authorised waste pickers-waste collectors.
While biodegradable waste is collected every day, non-biodegradable waste such as plastic is collected every Wednesday.
Tirunelveli: Know More- Tirunelveli, also known as Nellai and historically as Tinnevelly.
- It is a city in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
- It is the administrative headquarters of the Tirunelveli District.
- It is the sixth-largest municipal corporation in the state.
