sc-issues-directions-to-ncr-states-on-solid-waste-management

The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh governments to designate senior officers to supervise the process to achieve 100 per cent collection and segregation of solid waste.

 

Observing the states must make a realistic assessment of generated waste, a bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan directed the NCR states to fix an outer limit on achieving this target.

 

"The nodal officers dealing with both the issues shall file regular compliance reports starting from September 1, 2025. After every quarter compliance report shall be shall be filed in this court," it said.

 

The top court registrar was directed to ensure the report went to the bench dealing with the case.

 

"Unless proper publicity is given to the provisions of Solid Waste Management (SWM) Rules, 2016, and penalty is provided for non-compliance it cannot be effectively implemented. We direct NCR states and MCD to undertake massive awareness campaigns in this regard," the court added.

 

On the violations at construction and demolition sites, the apex court said compliance reports were filed by the air quality management.

 

"We direct CAQM to call for data of action taken by concerned authorities. They shall compile data upto end of July 2025 and file affidavit by September 1, 2025," it said.

 

The top court previously directed the Municipal Corporation of Delhi to start "massive" awareness drives through advertisements in print, electronic and social media to educate bulk waste generators in the national capital.

 

Bulk waste generators, it noted, produced large quantity of solid waste daily and directed the MCD for the awareness campaigns about the duties of various stakeholders.

 

The top court said the MCD needed to emphasise on the implementation of Rule 4 of the Solid Waste Management (SWM) Rules, 2016 The rule says waste generators, including domestic and institutional generators, have the duty to segregate waste into biodegradable, non-biodegradable, and domestic hazardous waste streams, and to hand over the segregated waste to authorised collectors.

 

The top court underlined the segregation of waste at source was of "vital importance" for the environment and asked the NCR states for compliances under the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016.The issue of solid waste management in Delhi-NCR stems from the air pollution matter in the NCR.