The Mother of Landfills

Our second day brought a challenging experience which tested even the strongest wills and stomachs. The day was scheduled to be spent with AmeriCares India, the Indian subsidiary of an international NGO operating in Mumbai. After meeting with the managing director of AmeriCares, Dr. Purvish Parikh, to learn about the organization’s work and impact, our team joined a mobile health clinic as it made its bimonthly visit to the slums outside the Shivajinagar landfill area.

After dealing with the traffic (clearly building up to being a recurrent theme) for over an hour in a hot bus, and a bit beaten down, I was completely unprepared for the sight of the solid waste trash hillocks that appeared in front of the bus’ windshield. These 5-6-storey or more tall hillocks were the dumping grounds for the majority of the city’s solid waste. Over time and given the healthy monsoon rains coupled with organic materials mixed in, the hillocks were sprouting a mantle of greenery. From a distance it almost looked like pretty green hills in the misting rain but as we approached closer, one could see the plastic and other refuse poking through. And then amidst the collage of trash, like the 3-D picture puzzles that reveal hidden images embedded within as the visual focal length moves into an optimum range, we noticed people picking their way through the trash, looking for recyclable objects or merely using the dump like one big open-air outhouse.

The team joined the mobile van in a side street of the community adjacent to the landfill and observed their clinic operations. However even our mere presence was disruptive to the clinic’s work. Community members thronged about us curious about the visitors from overseas. Soon however, the residents turned their attention to the medical staff who provided free blood pressure and diabetes screenings, consultations and medicines.

Our guide explained that many residents in the community especially women and children made their living picking through the landfill trash looking for recyclable materials to exchange for money and that many of them contracted illnesses and injuries as a result of tramping through the trash. All in all it was one of the more disadvantaged communities in the city. The impact of seeing humans living under such environmental conditions was very unsettling on many levels and many in our group were unusually silent on the way back to hotel. Coming up with solutions to such abject poverty is not easy although the experience was critical to our holistic understanding of the public health issues facing India today.