The Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) is facing a mounting sanitation crisis in its Ambattur zone, where reports of mass unauthorized absenteeism among sanitation staff persist, even after the civic body initiated a vigilance probe into the matter two weeks ago.
Residents Bear the Brunt of Irregular Waste Collection
Residents in areas like Mogappair East and Golden George Nagar continue to report severe lapses in door-to-door garbage collection and overflowing public bins. As of Thursday, key stretches such as EB Road in Mogappair East and Cooum River Road were littered with uncollected waste.
R Raman, a resident of Mogappair East, highlighted the dire situation. He stated that GCC bins on EB Road remained full until the afternoon with no compactor vehicles arriving to clear them. "People have started dumping waste directly into the bins because the door-to-door collection has become so unreliable," Raman explained. He added that sanitation workers failed to show up for collection on Venugopal Street, Thilak Street, and Church Road.
Official Claims vs. Ground Reality
The Ambattur zone, which generates approximately 400 tonnes of waste daily and lacks a waste-transfer station, employs 1,457 contract workers under the National Urban Livelihoods Mission (NULM) and 170 permanent staff.
Zonal officer R A Prabhakar downplayed the issue, claiming that only 6% of workers were absent on Thursday, a figure he described as routine. "We have streamlined the workforce since the complaints emerged and are not reporting high absenteeism like before," Prabhakar asserted. When pressed for photographic evidence of uncleared bins by The Times of India, the official was provided with specific locations. Later, assistant executive engineer A Muthukumarasamy sent images of cleared bins taken at 5:30 pm.
Allegations of "Ghost Workers" and Financial Irregularities
The situation took a more serious turn with allegations of financial malpractice. BJP state secretary 'Karate' R Thiagarajan, along with BJP councillor Uma Anandan, recently filed a complaint at Ripon Buildings. They alleged that "ghost workers" were drawing salaries in the Ambattur zone.
Thiagarajan claimed that only about 1,000 workers were genuinely enrolled for work, with the names of 400 individuals missing from the official rolls. "Salaries worth crores have been drawn for non-existent workers," he alleged. In response to these serious charges, the zonal officer confirmed that an interrogation of the workers is currently ongoing.
The crisis underscores a significant failure in civic management, with the GCC's vigilance probe, ordered by Commissioner J Kumaragurubaran, yet to yield visible improvements on the ground. The health hazard posed by accumulating garbage and the serious allegations of corruption now demand urgent and transparent resolution from the civic authorities.
