How Navjeevan Vihar Became Delhi’s First Colony To Send Zero Waste To Landfills For Seven Years

Delhi's waste problem is everyone’s problem. Every morning, Delhi wakes up to garbage! There are almost 11000+ tons of waste generated in our capital city every day, and barely half of it is processed. The rest goes to mountains like Ghazipur and Bhalswa that now tower higher than some of Delhi’s flyovers. It’s not just astonishing, but appalling!Residents across many colonies living in New Delhi complain of smell, civic bodies blame segregation failures and RWAs point to absent accountability. Despite years of campaigns, less than 40% of Delhi’s households segregate waste at source. But in the middle of all this stands a quiet contradiction: a small colony in South Delhi that hasn’t sent its waste to a landfill in over seven years.Welcome to Navjeevan

Vihar.At first glance, it looks like any other South Delhi colony - housing close to 280 households, mostly green cover. But during our field visits we saw something different.

The RRR (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) Centre is spotless in Navjeevan, where all kinds of waste are being segregated and in colour-coded bins, labelled, and also has compost pits right outside that smell faintly of wet soil for kitchen waste. We spoke to Monty, a security guard who has served the colony with quiet dedication for over nine years. With a proud smile, he recalled, “Earlier, the bins used to stink. Now, every household here segregates its waste.”His words carried the weight of someone who has witnessed real change, not the kind that happens overnight, but the kind built patiently through trust, persistence, and example. Monty explained further, “Madam herself checks the garbage disposal trucks and keeps an eye on waste fabric collection and electronic waste management.”Through Monty’s eyes, the transformation of Navjeevan comes alive, not as a top-down initiative, but as a collective effort where everyone, from residents to workers like him, plays a crucial role in keeping the colony clean and conscious.Ruby Makhija said, and we rightly quote - "Waste is not a ‘me’ problem. It’s an ‘us’ problem." She said this while we walked past the nearly segregated compost pits.Today, Navjeevan Vihar processes 125 kg of wet waste daily into compost and recycles nearly 100 kg of dry waste, sending nothing to landfill.

The Three Pillars Of A Waste-free Community

When we asked Ruby what keeps the system running, her answer came without pause: “Leadership, funding and trust. That’s all it takes. Get these right and waste will manage itself.”Here’s how her philosophy looks on the ground.

1. Leadership That Doesn’t Stay In The Office

It started with one person showing up. Every morning in the early months, Ruby would stand near the trucks, watching waste being collected, corrected, and weighed. She didn’t delegate responsibility, she modelled it.When households slipped up, the RWA didn’t fine them. They reminded, demonstrated, and followed up until sorting became a habit. “Accountability here isn’t about notices,” Ruby says. “It’s a routine.”Now, even close to seven years later, the system doesn’t depend on her presence. Every worker and resident knows what to do. Segregation has become muscle memory.

2. The Money Question:

In most colonies, waste management fees are a fight. In Navjeevan, 97% of residents voluntarily pay ₹1,200 a year.There are no penalties, only proof. The RWA shares transparent accounts, so people know where every rupee goes, paying the safai sahayaks, maintaining the compost pits, buying gloves and masks. What is also important here to note is the stark change in terminology used for people who help clean out garbage - safai wala or sahayak is a dignified term rather than outrightly labelling our community of helpers as kachrawala.And I think this dignity chain has really seen a big shift in ethos.

3. Trust: The Real Infrastructure

The most striking lesson from Navjeevan isn’t segregation, it's community trust! Ruby says, ‘More than being a model of waste management, Navjeevan is an example of community trust building program’Early on, the biggest resistance came from domestic workers, not residents. Many feared that if they spent extra time separating waste, employers would think they were slacking. So this is what they did.Since the domestic workers thought their work or pay might get cut now that they won’t be required to physically sort out the waste, they started getting worried about losing jobs or facing pay cuts.So Dr Ruby recalled the solution they came up with, “We started with trust. We gave the female domestic help and their daughters biodegradable sanitary pads for themselves and this was something they genuinely needed. This changed everything.” Once they felt respected, participation shot up. Today, domestic workers often correct residents if they see mixed waste.And then there are the dogs, proudly wearing their collars, healthy, vaccinated, sterilised, and well-fed. When one falls ill, the entire community comes together, collecting funds and arranging treatment. This simple act of care reveals something deeper: people unite when trust has been built over years of shared responsibility, working side by side to make their neighborhood safer and more humane for everyone, both people and animals.

What Keeps The Navjeevan Vihar Model Running

After our site visit, what struck us wasn’t infrastructure, but routine. Every actor in the system, RWA, workers, guards, and residents, is part of a duty loop that keeps accountability alive. Each link is respected, visible, and interdependent.The RRR centre, which we saw quite symbolically in the centre of Navjeevan Vihar colony, acts as a behavioural checkpoint.Navjeevan’s model is what governance scholars might call everyday institutionalisation - rules that don’t live in files but in habits.

Scaling This Model

When asked what it would take to replicate this elsewhere, Ruby is cautious. Policies can start systems but communities help sustain them - Dr Ruby Makhija, when asked about what according to her, is the reason this model works.She’s now helping similar models take root; from Rashtrapati Bhavan’s Amrit Udyan, where nine categories of waste are segregated, to cantonment boards in Beas, Palampur, and Wellington. But she insists that government schemes like Swachh Bharat can only go so far.

“You can’t copy and paste these models. I feel every community needs to build its own trust capital first.” Says Dr Ruby.When we think about scaling the Navjeevan model to other neighborhoods, a few realities come to mind. It is no small task. Navjeevan, after all, is a relatively affluent colony, and not every locality or RWA has similar resources to replicate its approach. Yet, money is not the real barrier. Managing waste responsibly, segregating it, reducing single-use plastics, and recycling requires more awareness than funding. It is a shift that begins at the individual level and takes root through collective behavior.The beauty of being human lies in our social nature: we instinctively mirror the actions of those around us. While we carry the capacity for chaos, we also possess the grace to become conscientious citizens, if guided by awareness and leadership. The goal, then, is not to replicate Navjeevan’s model in its entirety, but to ignite the same spirit that sustains it. What truly needs to scale is the latent empathy within communities, the quiet courage of a few individuals willing to start by segregating waste, choosing cloth over plastic, and, in doing so, inspiring others to follow.

What The Rest Of Delhi Can Learn

In our opinion, Navjeevan Vihar didn’t solve Delhi’s waste crisis overnight, but it did something harder: it changed behaviour. When a colony runs seven years without sending waste to a landfill, that’s not a miracle. That’s governance done right! As we left the colony, we realised one thing: Navjeevan Vihar didn’t just manage its waste, it managed to build belief; and maybe that’s what Delhi needs most!

Author- Tanya Mittal is a Delhi-based policy researcher and writer who has studied at Lady Shri Ram College and the Tata Institute of Social Sciences.Co author - Meenakshi Narayanan is a climate change researcher and consultant at a global consulting firm.