The Ajnar River clean-up in Biaora, Madhya Pradesh, has received formal backing from the Rajgarh district administration after repeated dumping left 20-year-old volunteer Bittu Tabahi considering whether to abandon his campaign. Rajgarh collector Girish Mishra met Bittu on Thursday, felicitated him for his work and assured him that the administration and municipal authority would support efforts to sustain the clean-up.
The response followed a report in the Times of India’s Bhopal edition about Bittu’s growing frustration with waste returning to the stretch of the river he had restored. The student had said that the river was being filled with waste faster than it could be cleaned, making it difficult for one person to keep the area clear.
Mishra told TOI that he had directed officials to prepare a roadmap for cleaning the entire river. He described Bittu’s work as commendable not only because he had removed waste from a section of the Ajnar, but also because he had encouraged others to participate in similar efforts.
Bittu said the collector had assured him that the municipal authority would extend all possible support to sustain the clean-up. He welcomed the commitment but said government assistance alone would not resolve the problem unless residents also stopped treating the river as a dumping ground.
“Every time I clean the river, people start dumping waste again,” Bittu had told TOI. He said that a single person’s initiative was not enough to keep the waterway clean and waste-free. The Ajnar, which flows through Biaora, has long faced dumping of plastic, household waste and debris.
Bittu’s campaign began as a largely self-funded effort. Using basic tools and, at times, his bare hands, he removed waste from the river and drew wider attention to its condition. His work later received municipal support, but the continuing dumping has exposed the difficulty of maintaining public spaces when clean-up is not accompanied by prevention and enforcement.
Bittu said the district administration and Biaora municipality had supported his mission whenever he sought help. However, he added that sections of the public continued to empty different kinds of waste into the river. He called for greater public awareness and said residents needed to understand that maintaining public landmarks and shared resources was a collective responsibility.
Officials said the administrative intervention was intended to ensure that the Ajnar’s restoration did not remain dependent on one individual. They said the larger task would involve building public participation, encouraging behavioural change and preventing littering in public spaces. The next formal step is the preparation of a roadmap for cleaning the entire river, as directed by the district administration.
