Taking strong exception to reckless dumping of municipal waste in the temple town of Vrindavan, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) on Tuesday slammed the civic authorities and directed them to ensure removal of garbage within two weeks.

The Bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Swatanter Kumar directed the Vrindavan municipal body to file an affidavit regarding the compliance of the order by November 3, the next date of hearing.

NGT was hearing a petition filed by a seer Madhumangal Shukla, against illegal and unregulated disposal of solid waste in the city. Shukla, submitted photographs before the green court showing that civic authorities were disposing the solid waste near landfill site near Bhatraol temple in the nearby pits in violation of Municipal Solid Waste Rules.

The plea had claimed that the only landfill site in the city has been sold to Mathura Mandi Samiti for setting up of a wholesale market resulting in reckless accumulation of garbage on streets.

Shukla said that entire environment of Vrindavan was suffering due to the lack of implementation of Municipal Solid Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules, 2000 as garbage was being disposed of carelessly in drains and on the banks of river Yamuna, leading to clogging and stagnation.

During the hearing, the counsel for Vrindavan Municipality however told the bench that the entire waste which was dumped at the site as shown in Shukla’s  photographs had been removed and dumped at the earmarked site. Shukla however retorted against Municipality’s aforesaid  claim,  to  NGT that their plea is erroneous and  blatantly misleading.

The NGT had earlier restrained the Vrindavan municipal corporation from burning domestic waste in the open and issued notices to the Environment Ministry, Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) and other concerned agencies in this regard.

Vrindavan is a town with 5,000 temples. Of these some even date back to 1570. It also has numerous ghats that extend all along the right bank of the Yamuna river.