Gurugram, Jan 23 (IANS): After Sector-23 market, the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) is now looking to convert the Sector-46 market into a polythene-free zone.

This is the second public area in the city where the MCG is trying out such an initiative.

Civic officials have been deployed at the market to carry out surprise checks at random to ensure the shopkeepers are not violating their orders.

The Sector-46 market has over 100 shops and more than 30 street vendors who use several kilograms of polythene everyday, MCG officials said on Saturday.

"For clean and healthy life, we have to completely stop using polythene and single-use plastic. All shopkeepers should be determined not to keep polythene in their shops. They should ask the customers coming to the market to carry either a cloth or a jute bag along with them," said Dheeraj Kumar, Joint Commissioner, Swachh Bharat Mission, MCG.

"When there will be no polythene demand, its use will be stopped automatically and our city will turn clean and beautiful," he added.

The Joint Commissioner said cleanliness cannot be achieved only on part of the government.

"It is very important to have citizens' participation in it. Every citizen should consider cleanliness as his/her moral responsibility and consider Gurugram as his/her home and contribute in making it clean," said Kuldeep Singh, Cleanliness Brand Ambassador of MCG.

"Stop using single-use plastic and polythene and make a habit of putting wet, dry and household harmful wastes in different dustbins at your homes. Most of the shopkeepers in the market have stopped using polythene and soon it will become a polythene-free market," he added.