In view of the increasing use of single-use plastic in the city since Covid-19 outbreak last year, the Municipal Corporation of Dehradun (MCD) has decided to start an anti-plastic campaign from February. The municipal commissioner, Vinay Shankar Pandey said that the State Government lifted the plastic ban to facilitate essential services amid the outbreak but the use of plastic by the locals has increased extensively for the last nine months. "We have already sent a recommendation last month to reinstate the plastic ban in the city so that the corporation can impose restrictions on the use of plastic by local residents, shopkeepers and other commercial establishments but we have not received any response from the administration on this matter so far," said Pandey. However, Pandey added that the corporation has planned to start an anti-plastic awareness campaign in the city from the second week of February to raise awareness among the locals. For the first seven to ten days, the MCD teams will raise awareness and inform locals to restrict plastic use. The corporation will also observe the effect of the campaign and will plan the further strategy accordingly, said
Pandey. Moreover, the commissioner said that the pandemic has certainly reversed the ban on single-use plastic in the city but he is optimistic that the local residents will restrict the use of plastic once the campaign will start.