Plastic bags ban arbitrary, discuss in Council before implementation: TDP

Reacting to the decision to impose a ban on Plastic Carry Bags from July 1 in the GHMC limits, Telugu Desam Party Floor Leader in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation Singi Reddy Srinivas Reddy on Sunday stated that the decision was arbitrary and demanded that the decision be discussed in General Council of the Corporation before being implemented.

Calling for a special General Council meeting be convened to discuss the ‘arbitrary’ decision, Mr Singi Reddy stated that it was taken without the GHMC must provide the people with an alternative to plastic bags before banning them from the city. 

Talking to INN, Mr Singi Reddy said that Mayor Banda Karthika Reddy has decided to impose the ban on the usage of plastic bags in the city, without looking at the difficulties that would be faced by the people of the twin cities.

The TDP leader pointed out that people living in GHMC limits use around 2.7 lakh plastic bags per day for various purposes like carrying vegetables, fruits and other groceries and implementation of any ban on these bags would put the them to immense inconvenience.

Apart from this, about 600 manufacturing units which have sprung up around the GHMC limits would be affected by the ban decision. “Out of these 600 units 72 units manufacture high quality plastic bags used for carrying clothes and other goods. If any ban is imposed on the plastic bags, about ten thousand people who are dependent on this industry will become unemployed,” the TDP leader pointed out.

Mr Srinivas Reddy suggested that these employees of plastic bag manufacturing units must first be trained to take up alternative vocations so that the ban will not leave them unemployed.

“If the ban on plastic bags is enforced immediately, the void can only be filled with around three lakh paper bags per day. This will have a negative impact on the environment in the longer run,” Mr Srinivas Reddy said.   He added that any ban should be enforced in phases, adding, “This alone will work.”