South City Corporation's roadside bins
It was a welcome sight to see the Dhaka South City Corporation's roadside waste bins that were installed right before Pahela Baishakh this year. We thought this would end the dumping of waste, wrappers, tissues and packets on the sides of the roads. We thought better of ourselves, thinking, maybe it was the lack of roadside bins that was the reason behind our callous behaviour.
But three months on, it seems it was not the bins that were lacking, but our civic sense. A report published on Sunday showed the sorry sight of the bins today. Some upturned, some stolen, and many being used for the purpose of dumping household waste. That the small receptacles were placed to be used not for household waste but only litter bins, seems lost on us, even though city corporation-employed people are supposed to be collecting this from the houses themselves.
Is it that the garbage collectors are not reaching every house? Then the City Corporation should look into this. But, it must also try to raise awareness on why the bins were placed in the first place and how they should be used. If our civic sense cannot be appealed to, as the City Corporation had hoped it would, then the 6,700 bins will not do much to change the filth and pollution that characterise our public spaces.
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