Despite ban being imposed repeatedly since 2012 in Dehradun by the state government , National Green Tribunal and the civic body, things have not improved a bit with the plastic bags being used with impunity across the city. Campaigns are being launched with fanfare.
Things abate for a time before they go back to the square one with something of a frenzy. This is what is happening in the city, runs the critical refrain among those who have vowed to make the city free from the use of such bags, to turn it into ‘Clean, Green Doon’ of their dream. “It is astonishing that penalties to be slapped on such use have failed to prove deterrent. Around 60 to 80 percent of the garbage being dumped in the city consists of non- biodegradable items,” said one of such persons dedicated to ‘Clean, Green Doon’.
Plastic bags pollute land, air and water to the grave detriment of the future of the city, say many of them while asking the authorities concerned to be more sincere for the cause of Clean, Green Doon in the interests of the posterity.
Achal Khare, a member of MAD (Making a Difference), a student activist group organizing cleanliness drives in the city, says, “Wherever we organize cleaning drives we find these polythene bags comprising maximum of the garbage.
As we go to the place a few days after we launch the cleanliness drives we see such polythene bags return. It is hard for us to separate the biodegradable and non biodegradable garbage.