Aurangabad: After a gap of five-and-a-half months, the Aurangabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) has decided to reopen the city’s sole dry waste sorting centre at Central Naka much to the delight of waste managers, informal waste pickers and experts.Gauri Mirashi of Carpe, an NGO, said the gate and pathway to the shed has already been opened. “The AMC has promised to clean up the shed and provide electricity, water and security for its functioning. A bailing machine will be installed at the centre to ease transportation of waste,” she added.Head of AMC’s solid waste management cell, Nandkishore Bhombe, confirmed that the centre would be reopened for processing dry waste.The closure of the centre in March had led to huge mismanagement of dry waste over the following months. The shed, built under Bajaj Majhi City, Swachh City, is set to be expanded after its revival.The city saw the opening of its first dry waste sorting centre at Central Naka on May 18, 2016. Canpack had built the shed through its CSR funds under the Bajaj Majhi City, Swachh City programme of the AMC and Carpe.Over the successive months, the centre had emerged as a sustainable and an economic model of solid waste management. At one point, around 100 wards practising segregation of waste at source were sending dry waste to the centre. By March, the centre had processed more than 1,000 tonnes of dry waste.Explaining the functioning of the shed, Mirashi said dry waste brought to the centre was manually segregated into different categories, based on their value by informal waste pickers.“At the end of the day, the waste pickers sold the high value material to the scrap dealers and earned up to Rs 400 a day,” said Mirashi.The municipal corporation did not have to make any investment for the operation of the dry waste.However, after the Naregaon/Mandki dump yard was shut in March, the AMC started dumping mixed waste at Central Naka. The dry waste sorting was shut without any explanation, pushing the waste pickers to work in unhygienic conditions and leaving the municipal dry waste in the streets.While speaking to TOI, Almitra Patel, a member of the Supreme Court committee for solid waste management, had expressed huge disappointment over the closure of the centre and advocated its revival.

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