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Navi Mumbai: Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporaton (NMMC) has revived its action against the use of single use plastic by vendors and other commercial establishments. The decision to take stringent measures against use of banned plastic bags is being taken to ensure both shop keepers as well as residents take upto the use of cloth bags for shopping purposes.
Officers are regularly conducting sudden inspections and are even conducting raids to confiscate the banned goods. Recently a special drive was undertaken between 1 July to 7 July by NMMC and total of 15 shops were found to be using the banned plastic bags. A fine of amount Rs 75,000 was levied on these shopkeepers and nearly 35 kilos of the banned goods was confiscated.
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“Single use plastic bags are banned therefore anyone found using this is liable for stringent punishment. The week-long drive was conducted in each of the wards like in Belapur 4 shops were fined Rs 20,000 and nearly 8 kilos of plastic bags was confiscated. Likewise, at Nerul ward 2 shops were found to be in possession of the bags and were fined accordingly. Sanitary inspectors randomly visited the shops in each of the wards and took appropriate action,” said an official from NMMC.
Residents were also asked to abstain using single use plastic for their day to day shopping. Offficals informed about the damage caused to the environment and residents were asked to cooperate by switching to using cloth bags.
The ban on single use plastic bag below 50 microns is in place since 2006 whereas from 2018 the ban was extended further to all kind of plastics and even thermocol. In the week-long drive, special squads formed at zonal level were also actively involved to seize the banned goods. “Zone I squad has succeeded in seizing 20 kilos of banned goods likewise the zone II confiscated 1.5 kilos goods. Both the zones have further levied fines on those stocking these. In total 34 kilo 200 grams of single use plastic goods were seized,” adds the official.
