Medium for the living

Narsing Das and Gagan Das are a couple from Janakpur that has been working as Informal Waste Workers in Sanepa, Lalitpur for the last 13 years. They are scrap pickers and make their living by picking up recyclables and selling it at scrap center nearby.

Narsing Das and Gagan Das are a couple from Janakpur that has been working as Informal Waste Workers in Sanepa, Lalitpur for the last 13 years. They are scrap pickers and make their living by picking up recyclables and selling it at scrap center nearby.

Both of them starts a day with the collection of plastic wastes from the streets and segregate it at open space that they have in their premises and sell it with good price at the scrap centre.  After having shared the results what both of them are getting, rest of the members of the group “Kalopul Fohor Byasthapan Samitee”, were also interested to have the same and seek helped from the project.

Rickshaw becomes life changer for Das coupleNarsing Das has called PRISM’s intervention a “life changing” event in his life. After he and his wife received a rickshaw support from PRISM, they have seen their daily income triple in the last four months. The pair used to earn about Rs 350/day; now, because of the rickshaw, they make about Rs 1000/day. The couple has also been able to put away Rs 30,000 in their savings bank account since they have gotten the rickshaw.

Centre for Integrated Urban Development (CIUD) has implemented the “Poverty Reduction of Informal Workers in Solid Waste management Sectors (PRISM) project with the funding support of the European Union and Practical Action since June 2011- May 2014.

Before they received support from the project, Narsing and Gagan used to walk around the banks of Bagmati carrying a 10 kilo capacity polythene sack. “That was the most we could take in a day. We lost a lot of time going to and fro the scrap center. Now, our rickshaw allows to carry up to 70 kilos per trip, which means we save a lot of time that we can spend collecting scrap,”, he explained.

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