As per the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016 in India, which one of the following statements is…

Answer: (c) The Rules provide for exact and elaborate criteria for the identification of sites for landfills and waste processing facilities.

Option (c) is correct because Schedule I of the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016 gives detailed site-selection criteria for sanitary landfills, such as minimum distances from rivers, ponds, highways, habitations and airports. The other three options misstate the rules.

• ✗ (a) Rule 4 asks every waste generator to segregate waste into three streams: bio-degradable, non bio-degradable and domestic hazardous waste. There is no five-way split.
• ✗ (b) Rule 2 applies the Rules far more widely than 'only' urban local bodies, notified towns and industrial townships. It also covers census towns, outgrowths of urban agglomerations, railways, airports, ports, defence establishments, SEZs and more.
• ✓ (c) Schedule I lays down criteria such as a landfill 100 metres from a river, 200 metres from a pond, highways, habitations, public parks and water supply wells, and 20 km from airports.
• ✗ (d) The Rules contain no ban on moving waste between districts. They say the State Pollution Control Board regulates inter-State movement of waste.
• • Since then The Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016 have since been superseded by the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2026, notified in January 2026 and in force from 1 April 2026. The new Rules make four-stream segregation (wet, dry, sanitary and special care waste) mandatory (PIB).

Remember · Under the 2016 Rules, waste is segregated into three streams and Schedule I fixes landfill siting distances; the 2026 Rules replaced these with four-stream segregation.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2019, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). · Report an error