Recycling in India

I know Ian has already written a bit in trash in India, but I wanted to add a bit. The practices of many Indians (not all) are very peculiar to an American. I have yet to see any sort of municipal garbage collection in India. There are a few trash cans and I will put on Flickr shortly, but often there is more trash around the can rather than in it. I once saw a large truck full of garbage, but I do not believe there there is any sort of organized pick up except in large apartment complexes.

There is a sort of recycling here. In the Diu town square, there is a vegetable market every morning. After the women selling the pineapples, bananas, okra, herbs, potatoes, and other vegetables leave, there is a huge pile of waste left. A person comes with a straw broom with no handle (a standard broom) to move this into a large pile. Next the cows and dogs make their way to the pile and pick it over. Then in the afternoon someone sets the pile on fire to burn the remaining waste off. This is not limited to the city vegetable market or Diu. I have seen this hundreds of times around India. It works well for "wet" waste, but not for plastic rubbish.

Another way to dispose of waste is to just dump it in the bay. On my first day in Diu, I was sitting on the picturesque town boardwalk watching the fishing boats. A woman in a slightly tattered sari comes to the side of the boardwalk holding a large purse. She proceeds to dump the contents of the purse, which was all vegetable, paper and plastic waste, into the bay. This would be akin to someone in Wolfeboro dumping a tote full of garbage into the water at the town dock. I was shocked. At least let the cows and dogs have their fill of it first.

Currently the festival of Ganesh Chaturthi is going on. Everywhere in Diu and Mumbai, communities acquire a large Ganesh statue and decorate it lavishly. They have processions with drummers and their Ganesh through the streets every afternoon. On September 25, the tenth day, all the relievers will parade to the seashore and drop the Ganesh statue in the water.

It is one thing for one woman to drop a purse full of garbage into the water, but thousands of 10 foot tall decorated Ganeshes? I was relieved when I read in the paper that there are some concerned actors in Mumbai who formed an NGO to publicize this environmental folly and propose alternatives. These idols are made of plaster of paris and painted beautifully with lead paints. They actors proposed using clay idols and natural paints. I hope for India's environmental future, this is not falling to deaf ears.