Himachal Pradesh has been ranked as top performing state in the country along with Union Territories (UTs) like Chandigarh, Delhi, Puducherry and big states like West Bengal as per the comparative evaluation report of Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB).

All these states/UTs have a total score of 21 out of 24 according to a report submitted to the National Green Tribunal by the CPCB regarding implementation of the Biomedical Waste Management Rules, 2016.

A state government official said the CPCB had identified 12 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to assess states with respect to effectiveness in monitoring, ensuring compliance and implementation of the Biomedical Waste Management Rules, 2016.

“After the rules were notified in 2016, the State Pollution Control Board has taken several initiatives to sensitize the institutions which mainly are allopathic, ayurvedic and veterinary hospitals/institutions to achieve the better compliance of these rules.

Besides, more than 100 trainings and workshops were organized by the State Board at state, district and local level to bring in all institutions under regulatory ambit of the Rules,” he added.

The official said Himachal had inventory of 8,853 health care institutions which falls under the ambit of the rules and out of which approximately 77 percent of the institutions had been authorized by the State Board. It is also pertinent to mention here that despite COVID pandemic condition, the Board had put in best efforts to enforce the regulatory measures for management of bio-medical waste and granted authorization to about 4,000 healthcare institutions which is almost 58 percent of the total authorization granted so far.

There were 4,125 allopathic institutions in the state out of which 3,147 institutions (about 76 percent) have been authorized by the Board so far.

The official said ayurvedic institutions have the highest level of compliance (about 91 percent), whereas 1,112 institutions had been authorized against the inventory of 1,228 institutions. Besides, the compliance level of veterinary institutions was about 72 percent whereas, 2,443 institutions possess authorization from the State Regulatory agency against the total inventory of 3,404 institutions.

In addition to this, there were 96 industrial units which also fall under the ambit of the Rules ibid and 91 units have been authorized so far.

There are two Common Biomedical Waste Treatment Facilities (CBWTFs) operating in the state with cumulative treatment and disposal capacity of 9.2 MT per day while incineration capacity is 2.4 MT/day.

“Status review of the Biomedical Waste Management in the state is being done at the level of the Chief Secretary from time to time.

These coordinated efforts have resulted into better implementation of the rules in the state,” he added.