Foot soldiers of Kerala’s silent revolution against waste
The 35,500 members of the Haritha Karma Sena have been involved in a tireless e ort to change people’s approach to handling household waste. S.R. Praveen talks to the workers, as waste collection and segregation emerge as a job with a decent pay packet, e
he rustling of plastic and paper, the thud of cardboard boxes, and the sounds of a friendly conversation emanate from the shed located on a plot of land near Chala Market in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala’s capital. Inside, two groups of women, 18 in all, dressed in green overcoats, sit in large circles, with the open space in the middle lled with mounds of non-biodegradable waste. Behind them are sacks of unsegregated waste stacked to almost the roof of the shed.
“We will nish sorting all of that in three or four days,” says T. Vasantha Kumari condently, as her hands unceasingly, and by habit, segregate the different kinds of plastic and paper waste. A Class 10 dropout, the 50-year-old now earns around ₹25,000 monthly from her work.
She is part of Kerala’s Haritha Karma Sena (HKS), involved in door-to-door collection of nonbiodegradable waste, which is segregated and handed over to dierent agencies for various types of recycling. The 35,500 members of the Sena, comprising mainly women, have now become the foot soldiers of the State’s wide-ranging eorts to manage waste and to develop better civic sense among people. The HKS, each unit of which is registered as a micro enterprise with the support of the Kudumbashree Mission, is now carrying out door-to-door collection of non-biodegradable waste in over 70% houses Statewide.
The need for this force came to the fore after a massive re at the 110-acre Brahmapuram dumping yard in Kochi in March 2023 that caused the State Pollution Control Board to impose a ne of ₹1.8 crore on the corporation. As per the Kerala State Solid Waste Management Policy 2018, 3.7 million tonnes of waste is generated in the State annually, out of which 77% is biodegradable waste, 18% is non-biodegradable and 5% is mixed.
TOn-ground challenges
The HKS has been in existence since 2018, but it was following the re that the State government launched the ‘Malinya Muktham Navakeralam’ (Waste-free New Kerala) campaign with the Sena having a bigger role to play in it. The Local Self-Government department also issued an order making user-fee payment mandatory for waste collection from shops and households, except for those belonging to the extremely poor categories. Suddenly, the Haritha Karma Sena had an incentive to increase coverage of households and shops. However, on the ground, pulling it o has not been an easy task, and there is still a long way to go.
“We started this HKS unit two years ago. In the initial months, it was hard. We used to get unwashed plastic packets from some households, especially those used for food delivery and milk pouches. It was quite a task to clean those. We would then dry and segregate them. When we request people to give us clean and dry plastic waste, some would tell us that since they were paying ₹100 every month, it was our job to clean it too,” says R.S. Beena, who heads the HKS unit near the Chala Market that has achieved 99% coverage of households and shops in the area.
Then, the team began to clean the waste in front of those who refused to do so, “to show the kind of eort we have to take”. Now, almost everyone has started giving them clean waste.
The Chala unit is one of the more successful ones in the State. As per information from Suchitwa Mission’s data team, the technical support group in the waste management sector in the State, out of the 30,733 HKS members whose earnings have been recorded, 135 get above ₹25,000 per month (with a few recording above ₹50,000); 12,008 members earn between ₹10,000 and ₹25,000 per month; 14,980 members between ₹5,000 and ₹10,000; and 3,610 members below ₹5,000. There are a few HKS units struggling, mainly in coastal Thiruvananthapuram, where household coverage still remains low.
“Even though waste collection through HKS has been made mandatory, only around 150 of the 800 households in my area have signed up,” says Josephine, who has been an HKS member from Beemapally ward for the past two years, joining after she had nished her postgraduation. She complains that many shopkeepers refuse to pay the monthly fee, with some demanding that they collect the food waste too. “We suggested that we could provide them with kitchen bins to process biodegradable waste into compost at home, they refused saying it could cause a worm infestation.”
The attempts to increase coverage led to backlash last year, with some YouTube channels even launching an organised campaign against the HKS, indirectly egging the public not to cooperate with the doorstep waste collectors.
From centralisation to local management
“A few HKS members may have behaved improperly, which could be partly attributed to their lack of education and exposure,” says R.S. Gopakumar, the health ocer of Thiruvananthapuram Corporation. “In wards where the councillor and the junior health inspectors have extended support to the HKS, it has been a success.” Ocials involved in the State’s waste management programme say that political parties have a key role to play in waste management eorts. At times, leaders at the local level shield major waste generators from action for violations. In some cases, protests by local residents were organised against even plastic shredding units or temporary storage facilities for non-biodegradable waste.
Kerala has witnessed massive protests that shut down two major centralised waste treatment plants. The Vilappilsala plant in Thiruvananthapuram was closed down following a 15year-long protest by local people, citing the pollution it caused to the water supply and the danger it posed to health. Though Njeliyanparamba in Kozhikode continued to function at a much reduced capacity after temporary closures due to protests, waste continued to pile up, with the leachate making life dicult for people in the locality. Now, plans are afoot to set up a waste-to-energy plant in this location, but it has been facing much opposition from the local population. After the winding down of the centralised plants, the State shifted to a decentralised waste management plan, and to the formation of the HKS.
Some HKS units, like the one at Anthur municipality in Kannur, have found a way to earn additional income by diversifying. “We collect 8,500 kilograms of plastic waste monthly from 7,611 households and 635 shops. This work takes up around 15 days a month,” says T.V. Suma, who heads the Anthur HKS unit with 28 members. With time on hand, they also process food waste collected from a few shops in aerobic bins to convert it into organic manure, which they sell at ₹20 per kg.
“Our group also rears sh and does some catering work. I used to work as a tailor. In the initial days, I felt a bit of shame in carrying the sacks to collect waste, but now I do it with a lot of pride,” she says. Among the women in the group are widows working for the rst time in their lives, as well as those who used to work as sales women in textile shops. “This has become a very eective business model for all of us.”
Behind HKS’ success
The HKS was not created in a vacuum. Kudumbashree, the Kerala government’s poverty eradication and women empowerment programme, forms its backbone. Many women who are now part of the HKS were earlier part of Cleanwell, the waste management initiative of the Kudumbashree launched at the turn of the millennium. With the closing down of the centralised waste management facilities, many of them lost their jobs.
Following this, the local bodies in the State also slowly shifted to decentralised waste management to handle biodegradable waste, with community level aerobic bins or biogas plants and kitchen bins at home. The government has also been setting up chicken waste rendering units, sewage treatment plants, and dual chamber incinerators to handle
sanitary
Haritha Karma Sena workers sorting non-biodegradable waste at a centre at Chala in Thiruvananthapuram; (below) garbage collected from Kowdiar being sorted. waste in various parts of the State. The handling of the remaining non-biodegradable waste thus became an enterprise opportunity for the HKS units.
“We need to acknowledge the way Kudumbashree has imparted employability skills to a large number of women and also given them the condence to work in the public sphere,” says N. Jagajeevan, consultant, Malinya Muktham Nava Keralam Campaign, started in 2022, to make the State garbage-free. He credits the women with being quickly able to organise themselves to form HKS units and bring about thought and behaviour change among people. The Kerala Institute of Local Administration (KILA), the Suchitwa Mission, and the Kerala Solid Waste Management Project were also instrumental in providing several training sessions to HKS members.
We need to acknowledge the way Kudumbashree has imparted employability skills to a large number of women and also given them the condence to work in the public sphere
Awareness among migrant workers
Although public awareness has increased, the Minister for the Local Self-Government department M.B. Rajesh is not satised with the pace at which it is happening. “Though change is visible in cities like Kochi, I have seen a lot of plastic bags and bottles thrown out in the open in smaller towns during my recent election campaigning journeys. The Sena’s coverage of households has increased, but many shopkeepers are yet to sign up. Much of the waste that we see in our public spaces come from shops,” he says, adding that awareness in the migrant worker population is also needed, preferably in the language they are most familiar with. As for the future of Haritha Karma Sena, he says that the government is looking at ways to improve their segregation mechanism with more training, which would reduce the number of rejects and increase revenue. They will also be encouraged to diversify, by developing value-added products, from segregated waste materials. The government has also initiated plans to increase the number of mini collection facilities for storage of the segregated waste.