Picture this: a group of determined rural women, adorned in their colourful sarees and gloves, are riding tricycles in the hilly terrain of Odisha, filled with hope and responsibility.

Proudly called Swachhta Sathis, their mission begins at the doorsteps of homes and shops, where they have instilled a new habit of neatly sorting waste at the source. Through door-to-door interactions and lively village meetings, these women have been educating their communities about the detrimental effects of single-use plastics.

The journey doesn’t end at collection. The waste travels to local segregation sheds, where their skilled hands and meticulous work processes separate useful recyclables from non-recyclable materials.

High-value plastics such as PET bottles find new life in the hands of registered recyclers, transforming into new plastic products that once again circulate through their everyday lives. Meanwhile, low-value plastics like multi-layered plastics (MLP) are channeled to serve in road construction and as alternative fuels in cement kilns.

This initiative has not only processed over 275 metric tonnes of plastic waste but has also forged meaningful livelihoods for around 470 rural women. The revenue generated in this process is used for the operation and maintenance of this initiative, while also ensuring a circular economy by reducing landfill waste.

Behind this self-sustaining waste management approach is Manoj Satyawan Mahajan, a 2019 batch IAS officer and collector and district magistrate of Sundargarh.

What the IAS officer saw and why he decided to act

In 2019, Manoj recalls, the first phase of the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) came to a close, paving the way for Phase 2, which rolled out in 2021-22. As the mission evolved, so did the approach—under new state guidelines, villages were encouraged to collaborate more closely with nearby towns.

Through the Urban Rural Convergence (URC) model, rural waste was now being transported to Urban Local Bodies (ULBs), bridging the gap between........

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