Bhalswa fire: Mayor, NDMC commissioner to visit landfill site

The mayor and commissioner of north Delhi will visit the Bhalswa landfill site Tuesday to take stock of the situation there, even as fire continued to rage in parts of the leviathan garbage dump, officials said.

Mayor Adesh Gupta and Municipal Commissioner Madhup Vyas are expected to arrive at the site shortly.

"They are on their way to the landfill site to take stock of the situation," a senior NDMC official told PTI.

Bhalswa landfill site falls under the jurisdiction of the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC). The nearly 50 metre-high heap at Bhalswa got saturated way beyond its capacity several years ago.

Fire incidents keep taking place at the humongous site on and off, caused by natural factors or triggered by some incendiary material.

Fire has been raging at Bhalswa landfill site since October 20, which has raised concerns about the air quality in the national capital region further deteriorating.

The Delhi Fire Service (DFS) department had on Monday night said that the blaze at the site was "almost" brought under control by 7:30 pm.

A senior DFS official Tuesday, however, said fire was still raging at the dump site.

Delhi's air quality Tuesday remained in 'poor' category, a day after it had improved from "very poor" Air Quality Index (AQI) zone. But experts have said it might deteriorate in coming days due to the toxic air coming out of the fire at the Bhalswa landfill site.

Meanwhile, Delhi Environment Minister Imran Hussain had on Monday expressed serious concern over the fire, as the city is already fighting the adverse impact of stubble burning in neighbouring states.

He directed the three municipal corporations to work on preventing incidents of fire at landfill sites. He also told officials of the Delhi Fire Services to depute one fire tender exclusively to put out future incidents of fire at Bhalswa landfill site.