BANDIPORA, AUGUST 17: District Administration Bandipora, in collaboration with Municipal Council Bandipora, organised a Composting Exhibition at the Conference Hall, Mini Secretariat, Bandipora, to promote home composting, source segregation and scientific management of wet waste as part of the district’s ongoing Swachhta 50-50 initiative.
The exhibition featured live demonstrations and practical solutions for managing wet waste at the household level. Participants were shown how kitchen and other organic waste could be processed through suitable technologies to generate useful outputs, including biogas and manure, with the residual manure being suitable for use in orchards and other agricultural activities.
Addressing the gathering, Deputy Commissioner (DC) Bandipora, Indu Kanwal Chib, said that the District Administration had been conducting a series of activities on waste management to build awareness and prepare citizens for the next phase of Swachhta 50-50. She informed that, from September 1, 2026, Block Development Offices and Municipal Council/Urban Local Bodies would stop collecting wet waste from households, making household-level management of wet waste an important part of the district’s waste-management strategy.
The Deputy Commissioner said that several companies and organisations were coming forward with solutions for scientific waste management and stressed that every citizen had a role to play. She said that she is personally monitoring the progress of Swachhta 50-50 on a daily basis and that around 930 teams comprising School Eco Clubs and Anganwadi workers had been created. Each team would engage with 50 households and five shops, focusing on waste segregation, payment of user fees, composting and use of cloth bags.
The DC said that these teams had already covered and sensitised around 39,000 households in the district. For the first phase, the target had been fixed at 40,000 households, while around 87 percent of the baseline survey had been completed. She added that each household had been provided a unique QR code for monitoring and implementation of the initiative. She also cautioned that action would be taken in cases of non-compliance with the prescribed waste-management practices.
The DC said that the District Administration, including the Rural Development Department and Urban Development Department, had been working tirelessly to strengthen the waste-management system and called upon citizens to cooperate fully. Emphasising the importance of individual responsibility, she said that every act of change must begin with one’s own self.
Resource persons from the Indian Pollution Control Association (IPCA) also participated in the exhibition and sensitised participants about scientific waste management, the importance of source segregation and decentralised processing of wet waste. They explained the properties and functioning of the Aerobin, an insulated high-efficiency composter designed to process kitchen and garden waste into nutrient-rich compost without the need for manual turning.
The exhibition provided visitors an opportunity to learn about different composting methods, including home composting, vermicomposting, earthen-pot composting, leaf composting, community composting and solutions for bulk waste generators. Discussions were also held on practical ways to reduce the quantity of wet waste reaching dumping sites and to convert organic waste into a useful resource.
The Deputy Commissioner appreciated the efforts of all departments, experts and stakeholders involved in organising the exhibition and reiterated that cleanliness and scientific waste management could not be achieved by the administration alone. She called for active participation of citizens, schools, offices, institutions and commercial establishments in making Bandipora cleaner, greener and healthier.
Earlier, the Deputy Commissioner inspected the stalls set up by students, who presented innovative ideas, models and practical solutions for waste management. The DC interacted with the students, appreciated their efforts and encouraged them to continue promoting sustainable waste-management practices in their schools and communities.
The event was attended by DPO ICDS Bandipora Yaar Ali Khan, Assistant Commissioner Panchayat Aijaz Ali, Block Development Officers; CEO MC Bandipora; Dr Raja Muzaffar Bhat, RTI Activist and environmentalist besides students, officers, officials, representatives and other stakeholders.
