The ongoing Pushkarams is a sanitary challenge of mammoth proportions to municipal authorities.
Dubbed the Kumbh Mela of the south, the Krishna river festival draws vast gatherings of pilgrims to the bathing ghats. Lakhs of Hindus are pouring into the city and such a large-scale event poses unfathomable challenges for organisers, especially when it comes to sanitation.
Over 12 days, some 3.5 crore pilgrims are expected to bathe in the Krishna waters. The first dip took place on Friday and pilgrims will continue to arrive until August 23 to cleanse their sins and reaffirm their faith at the festival, which takes place every 12 years.
One section of people which makes things going at the ghats is the cleaners working round the clock. Sporting lemon yellow and orange jackets, the workers move around clearing garbage.
18,000 sanitation
staff deputed
In addition to the over 4,000 sanitation workers of the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation, the civic authorities have roped in nearly 14,000 workers from various other municipal bodies to ensure complete hygiene in and around the city. “I did not want to miss this once-in-12-years chance of taking a dip in the river but was also worried about the hygiene at the ghats. But the scene here has taken me by surprise. The ghats are clean and tidy and the whole exercise is such a smooth affair,” said M. Sravan Kumar, a technician in the Indian Air Force, Visakhapatnam.
His friends Venkata Ramana and Srinu echo similar views expressing satisfaction over the arrangements.
“With the voice on the public address system incessantly repeating the dos and don’ts at the ghats, there is no scope of anybody going wrong,” felt Siva Parvathi, a housewife from Guntur, pulling her wet hair back into a knot.
Farm workers roped in
Sivaleela is one of the workers roped in for sanitation.
An agriculture coolie from Upparapalem village in Ponnur mandal, she is among 28 others of her ilk who are deployed at the ghats to keep the place clean. “Back home, there is no farm work in the absence of irrigation water. That’s why we are here to earn something during these 12 days,” she said, informing that each hired worker like her is paid a sum of Rs. 175 for a six-hour shift.
“Men are paid Rs. 200 because they go into the waters and clear any objects left behind like flowers and tiny coconut shreds that the pilgrims offer to the river.
To make some extra money, some of them opt for a second shift also which allows them to earn Rs. 375 per day in addition to free food.
