A day after the Deonar dumping ground fire engulfed the area in thick smog, the local residents staged a protest against the administration at Azad Maidan on Tuesday.
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This comes a month after another major fire broke out at Deonar.
About 95 per cent of the fire has been brought under control, authorities said, as 10 fire engines battled the blaze. “We had asked IIT and NIRI to look into the problem of fire in the (dumping) ground and received their report two days back”. The latest fire was third such incident at the largest dumping facility in the city since January. The BMC had then promised to position fire-fighting vehicles near the dumping ground, but when the fire broke out on Sunday, there was virtually no response from the fire brigade. Experts blame the lack of waste management policy and crammed dumping yards in Mumbai’s municipalities for the Deonar fire.
Fresh smoke was witnessed this morning at the Deonar dumping ground, where the fire which has been raging for three days now intensified last evening even as people living in the vicinity complained of discomfort due to the fumes emanating from the site. Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar has said a two-member special team will be sent to investigate the incident.
“The answers given by Mehta were not satisfactory and hence we walked out to register our protest”, Praveen Chheda, Leader of Opposition, said. The fact that these fires, and resultant smoke clouds, could actually be spotted from space may tell you how serious the issue was.
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Meanwhile, the blaze which erupted on Saturday at Mulund (E) dumping ground, was put out at around 12.30 pm on Sunday, fire brigade officials said.
