| Why is it so much garbage in the streets of Delhi? |
India is developing and the infrastructure is in process. We are about to bring consciousness to the people, but a part of the population is still not educated. The educated part would use the garbage bins, because they would know why we should use it.
Delhi is the metropolis, the capital of India. This is a big town and you will find all kinds of attitudes here. Things are a bit better than before when it comes to garbage in the street, but you will find differences between parts of Delhi. Still, we have to admit that we do not notice the garbage in the streets. We are so used to having it here.
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| What do you do with your own garbage? |
We throw our garbage in the garbage bin. The government collects the garbage from our neighbourhood. They have employed sweepers and there are trucks which take it to the landfills.
Do you have any thoughts about recycling?
Making use out of waste is a good thing. We have been doing it for
quite some time now. We save old newspapers and plastic and sell it
to boys, who come to the door. They re-sell it to a higher price.
Retailers are interested in old newspapers, they use for wrapping foodstuff and other things. We also buy recycled paper. Our
impression is that there is quite a high consciousness about
recycling among people in general. |
Photo: Nae Kaneko |
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| What do you know about rag pickers? |
| Rag pickers live on a day to day basis. By segregating and re-selling garbage, they earn some money to make a living. The people that do these jobs are people living below the poverty line, and they do this because they have no other choice. They do not attend school because they cannot afford it. |
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| Do the rag pickers come from a lower layer of the society? |
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| Earlier it was the lower caste that took care of the waste, but today you cannot se such a division. People who used to be from a lower caste are now highly educated. But of course the poor people are often the ones forced to do the job because of poverty. It is all about education. |
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The local market near CSE is where we had our first experience of a typical public space in Delhi. The streets seemed very different to us and we were quite surprised to find garbage floating everywhere. Therefore we went back to interview some people on their attitudes toward garbage and waste management in Delhi.