By Sarah Hannan in Aladeniya Recent social media reports drew attention to an ongoing garbage dumping incident along the perimeter of the Hinguruwana Forest Reserve located in Aladeniya. This is not the first time the Hinguruwana Forest Reserve has been in the media’s spotlight, as last October, the residents of the area had thwarted a move made by a businessman to dump a stock of rotting dried fish there. The area residents said that most of the garbage dumping takes place at the hands of outsiders, as they toss bags of non-perishables such as polythene bags, bottles, cans, and PET bottles. “Most of the time, it happens in the night, which makes it difficult to catch anyone in the act of dumping garbage. The garbage that is tossed along the perimeters of the reserve is then dragged into the reserve by monkeys and other wild animals, which eventually falls into the stream running across the forest, polluting its waters,” D. Kodikara, a resident of Aladeniya, noted. According to the District Forest Office in Kandy, they are unable to monitor the situation or take action against such persons as the garbage is dumped at the edge of the forest. Speaking to The Morning, Kandy District Forest Office Divisional Forest Officer L.A.L. Dhammikatissa said:

“Action needs to be taken by the respective pradeshiya sabha to at least make garbage bins available in areas where people frequently dump garbage. Alternatively, as the Forest Department, we are looking at setting up perimeter fences, so the dumped garbage will not be pushed into the reserve. However, we are not in a position to prevent the wild animals from dragging the garbage to the forest.”

  Local Government partly responsible If the Harispattuwa Pradeshiya Sabha could at least send in a truck to gather the roadside garbage regularly, Dhammikatissa believes people will stop littering. He stated that if the area is free of garbage and kept clean, people will be reluctant to litter. When asked whether the Range Forest Office could send in a forest ranger to monitor the activities in the area, he said that manpower is seen as a luxury within the department. “Each range office has only two range officers and they are assigned to oversee forest areas in at least three divisional secretariats. In the case of the Kandy District, we have four such range offices; namely, Nawalapitiya, Kandy, Teldeniya, and Hunnasgiriya. On the other hand, the urban/municipal councils can easily allocate at least a garbage collection team, which is handling the garbage in the respective areas, to collect the roadside garbage,” Dhammikatissa reiterated. Despite several notices and hoardings that stand as empty reminders on the roadside, people seem to take no notice of them and have tossed garbage right under the signage which raises the question on whether they truly care for their surroundings. Moreover, we were told by the District Forest Office that when an incident such as garbage dumping by an outsider takes place in broad daylight, the residents do fire a call to the respective range office. Yet, these complaints are not often backed with testimonies or photographic evidence to take action against the persons who have performed the act. The range offices are given incident reporting forms to record any incident which is considered to be damage caused to the forest and its biodiversity. However, when there is no written testimony, even the Forest Department is unable to take due action. RDA and CEB old instigators? We were also told that there are some concrete lamp posts that the Road Development Authority (RDA) had left behind which have been sitting at the perimeter of the Hinguruwana Forest Reserve for the past three years. Recently, someone had dumped a used mattress on these pillars, and taking a cue from that act, people are now habitually dumping garbage at the said site. “It is a behavioural and attitude change that needs to be instilled in these people. The moment they see some construction material or rubble left behind, they are quick to presume that the site is considered a garbage dump. We did request the RDA to move these concrete lamp posts when they had left them on the roadside, but for all these years, no one from the RDA has done anything about it,” Kandy Range Forest Officer Mahendran Nandasena weighed in. During our visit to the site, there were wooden posts instead of concrete posts which were laid on either side of the road, and were now attracting stray animals and illegal garbage dumpers alike. When we contacted the RDA office in Kandy, Kandy Division Executive Engineer T.M.Y.K. Tennakoon had a different narrative. “They were concrete posts that the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) office in Aladeniya had unloaded to replace the wooden posts that were previously installed to pull the electricity across the area. We received several complaints regarding these posts and about the people dumping garbage in the vicinity as well,” he said. According to Tennakoon, the CEB has run out of storage space to keep their obsolete inventory and is leaving these posts on the perimeters of the reserve. “The RDA along with the Harispattuwa Pradeshiya Sabha Chairman visited the site for inspection. We then summoned the CEB area engineer and requested them to move those posts, but they informed us that they have run out of space to keep these wooden posts,” he noted.