Mokokchung Times News
January 30, 2022
Aongza Ward is undoubtedly the best maintained ward in Mokokchung Town and is looked up upon as a model ward in terms of cleanliness and maintenance. The ward has been winning accolades over the years and its strengths lies in a combination of leadership and community participation. In 2017, a board was constituted by the community to undertake beautification and cleanliness initiatives in the ward which has yielded positive results.
Talking to Mokokchung Times, Kikumzulu, Chairman of the Socio-Environment Management Board (SEMB), said that the boardwas created on 2ndSeptember 2017 with the aim to “Beautify, maintain cleanliness and hygiene, and public well-being of the ward.”
The board has a total of 40 members and the ward is divided into 15 clusters under which various social works are done through community participation.The board works under the Aongza Ward Yimden and functions with the help of donations from well-wishers and contributions from the community members.
He said that waste management is an integral aspect of the board wherein waste deposits from households are collected twice a week on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Segregation of waste is done in three ways. “Perishable wastes are kept in compost pits, Recyclable plastic waste are separated and delivered to MMC’s Material Recovery Facility, while any other type of non-recyclable waste are sent to MMC dumping site through garbage trucks,” he explained.
The works undertaken by the board includes setting up of 35 plastic waste bins, lime whitewashing of walls every winter to avoid insects and prevent diseases, management of flower gardens, seminars on waste management and segregation, dog tag registration and vaccination, cleaning of roads, drainage, streams and surrounding areas, conversion of garbage collection site to ‘Heritage Wall’ at IOC area etc.
The efforts made by the board have brought laurels to the Ward by consecutively being awarded “Best Maintained Ward” by Mokokchung Municipal Council (MMC) under Swachh Bharat Mission for five years (2017 – 2021) , and awarded 2nd Prize on two separate accounts for “Plastic Waste to Art” exhibition (2019 and 2021).
On a personal note, Chairman of the Socio-Environment Management Board said that he takes “cleaning waste everyday as a personal challenge” and further added that he wants to set an example for the people of other communities that “Mokokchung is truly a land of pioneers.” He was also optimistic that the people of different wards in the town are also slowly understanding the importance of waste segregation and are now well sensitized.