New Delhi: BJP MP from East Delhi Gautam Gambhir on Wednesday said that reduction of height of the Ghazipur landfill has been his priority from day one, and claimed that in three years the massive dump will be "decimated totally".
A statement issued by his office said that biomining of the legacy waste is being carried out using a trommel machine since October 2019.
It claimed that 18-20 metres of the landfill's height has been reduced at different stretches from the top.
"As a parliamentarian, it is my duty to ensure that the Prime Minister's vision of Swachh Bharat is fulfilled and cleanliness in my area is maintained. My first promise for the people of my constituency was the reduction of the Ghazipur landfill, and it has been my priority since day one," Mr Gambhir said.
"I have been constantly working on getting East Delhi rid of this mammoth garbage mountain. I am answerable to the people who have voted for me, and I want to reassure them that in three years' time, it will be decimated totally," he was quoted as saying in the statement.
The East Delhi MP who was elected in the 2019 elections, also thanked Lt Governor V K Saxena, saying, he is the "guiding force behind this mammoth task".
Describing the landfill sites in Delhi as "grave health hazards" and a "national shame", Lt Governor Saxena in July had reached out to the people and sought their ideas that could help efforts by authorities in getting rid of these "unseemly mountains of garbage".
In a post on Twitter, the LG shared a poster bearing the tagline -- "The challenge we have inherited since years! Let's come together to overcome it".
The civic officials had earlier said that the deadline to flatten the Ghazipur landfill is December 2024 while efforts are on to raze the Bhalaswa dumping site by July next year. The Okhla landfill is likely to be flattened by December 2023.
In 2019, the height of the Ghazipur landfill was 65 meters which was only eight meters less than the height of Qutub Minar.
In 2017, a portion of the Ghazipur landfill had fallen on an adjacent road in which two people were killed.
The statement from Gambhir's office on Wednesday also said that "15 MT (metric tonne) lakh legacy waste has been biomined so far. And, daily approximately 6000-7000 MT legacy waste is being biomined. Presently, 18 trommeling machines has been deployed for bio-mining of legacy waste at the Ghazipur site.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)