The quantity and quality of wastes generated from households varies, according to income, food habits, number of family members (family size) and their age, life style, educational and occupational status [8, 9]. In this study, 329 solid waste samples from 47 households, involving a total population of 220 were collected. A total of 374.263 kg of waste is collected during the survey. Table 2 shows the results of descriptive statistics of the waste samples collected from 47 households. The average generation of waste from a household was 0.26 ± 0.08 kg/c/d with an average 4.68 residents/household. The minimum and maximum values of generated waste are 0.134 and 0.528 kg/c/d, respectively, which indicate significant variability of per capita waste generated by different households. The data set is moderately skewed right (skewness = +0.832). The value of kurtosis (< 3) indicates the distribution is platycurtic i.e. lower and broader centre peak with shorter and thinner tails.

Table 3 compares the household waste generation rates from different cities of world. It could be seen from Table 3 that the per capita waste generation rate in Rishikesh is very similar to other cities of developing countries such as Beijing, Suzhou, Bolgatanta, Cape Haitian city except Takoradi. The waste generation rate is very high in case of Mexicali city (0.981 kg/c/d), which is comparatively developed city.

The collected household waste was composed of organic or food waste (vegetables and fruits waste, leftover food, fish and meat wastes), plastic and polythene waste, paper and cardboard waste, glass and ceramic wastes and other wastes such as metal waste, clothes etc. Fig. 4 shows the percentage composition of household waste collected during the survey. The largest component, which accounted to 57.3% was found to be the food or organic waste. This is very high when compared to the developed cities such as Wales and Dublin, which has only 26.79 and 40.48% food waste, respectively (Table 3).

The composition analysis of household waste indicates that the major portion of the waste i.e. organic waste (57.3%) is easily biodegradable and can be managed at household or community level through compositing.

In the surveyed households, the minimum persons in the family were two (n = 3) and the maximum persons in the household were 14 (n = 1). The frequencies of family size of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 in the studied sample were 12, 10, 10, 6, 2 and 3 households, respectively. Fig. 5 shows the variation in per capita household waste generation rate with number of family members in a house. It could be clearly seen from the Fig. 5 that per capita household waste generation rate decreases with increasing family size.

For example, waste generation rate decreased from 0.37 ± 0.07 kg/c/d for a family of 2 members (n = 3) to 0.19 ± 0.03 kg/c/d for a family of 8 members (n = 3). This indicates the environmental importance of Indian traditional group living system i.e. one family one kitchen. Previous studies also indicate the similar relationship between the household waste generation rate and family size [9–11].

The per capita household waste generation rate according to family size was further subjected to ANOVA test for statistical analysis. The results of ANOVA test are presented in Table 4, which indicate significant relationship between family size and household waste generation (p < 0.05). The average waste generation rate decreased from 0.313 to 0.194 kg/c/d when family size increased from 3 to > 5. It is well known that the family size in Indian metro cities such as Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai etc. is smaller than other cities. For example, the average family size in India is 5 while in Hyderabad, a metro city is 4 [12]. This could be the major factor for the higher per capita MSW generated by all the Indian metro cities (> 0.5 kg/c/d) than Rishikesh.

To understand the effect of each day of the week (Monday to Sunday) on household waste generation rate, the data set of samples collected in the first phase of the study was analysed through one-way ANOVA test. The results of ANOVA test are presented in Table 5. It is clearly evident from Table 5 that there is significant difference between each day of week and household waste generation rate (p < 0.05). The maximum waste generated (1.407 kg/d) by a household is on Sunday and the least was generated (0.356 kg/d) on middle of the week i.e. Thursday. It is quite understandable that in India people usually do shopping on weekends or holidays. Mostly we have six working days (Friday to Saturday) and one holiday i.e. Sunday in a week. Therefore, it is expected that accumulation of waste such as packaging materials would be more on Sundays. Similar results of household waste generation rate in China were reported by Gu et al. [9]. The authors observed that the household waste generation rate was higher on weekends (Saturday–Sunday) compared to week days (Monday–Friday).

Waste segregation at source for example at household level is a critical issue for the sustainable management of MSW. Considering its importance, the waste should be segregated into two categories: (a) biodegradable and (b) non-biodegradable according to the MSW Management Rules 2000 notified by Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India. The MSW management rules 2000 have been recently revamped in 2016 and renamed as Solid Waste Management (SWM) Rules 2016. According to new rules, waste should be segregated into three categories: (a) Biodegradable; (b) Non-biodegradable and (c) Domestic Hazardous Waste. However, source segregation is not practiced at all in the existing scenario at Rishikesh. In general, people (residents) are not aware of the importance of waste segregation and their participation is nil. Therefore, people must be educated, aware and sensitized about the importance of segregation of household waste at source. They should also be educated to segregate waste into the three categories as mentioned in SWM Rules 2016.

Informal sectors such as rag-pickers play important role in segregation of recyclable waste in most of the Indian cities including Rishikesh. The Municipal Corporation should include them into the loop for managing the MSW. Formalization of rag-pickers and other informal sectors such as waste collectors and recycling industries has also been proposed in the SWM Rules 2016.

Poor MSW collection efficiency is another challenging issue in Rishikesh. At present, the collection efficiency is only 60% of the total MSW generated in Rishikesh compared to 70–90% in the major metro cities of India [13]. There should be 100% door-to-collection to improve the overall collection efficiency. There could be multiple factors for poor collection efficiency. Inadequate infrastructure (shortage of community bins and vehicles, and poor roads) and poor management (un-optimized root, improper bin collection systems and schedule) are the critical factors affecting collection efficiency [14–17]. In Rishikesh, community bins are not enough to cover the city. Moreover, the bins are not located with proper planning, which results in unequal distance of community bins. The community bins were found to be overloaded in most of the places during the field visit (Fig. 2). There was no separate bin for biodegradable or non-biodegradable waste. Littering of household solid waste has been observed during the field visit in the city, which is an outcome of poor collection efficiency, shortage of community bins and lack of awareness among the citizens. In the SWM rules 2016, littering of waste is offensive and the ULBs are empowered for spot fine in case they find anyone littering the solid waste. However, this has not been implemented so far in the Rishikesh city by the ULB. The major limitations for inadequate community bins and poor collection efficiency cited by the ULB were the lack of infrastructure, limited manpower and financial constraints.

This is the most neglected area of MSW management in India as about 90% of the MSW is disposed unscientifically to open dumping sites [18]. The current waste disposal in Rishikesh is unsound as un-segregated waste is dumped in to the open dumping site. Moreover, the dumping site is not scientifically managed in the Rishikesh. Open dumping at land is prone to flooding during rain and it could be the major source of surface water contamination. There is a high risk of ground water contamination via leachate percolation in open dumping site. Unscientific management of solid waste is a serious health hazard for the residents of the city. There is a high risk of spreading the communicable diseases for example Dengue, Typhoid, Malaria etc., which are very common in India and other South Asian countries during rainy season. Therefore, there is an urgent need to address the scientific disposal of MSW in Rishikesh. A new site for the scientific disposal of MSW has been identified by the Rishikesh ULB. However, the local residents near the proposed MSW disposal site are doing protest, which aggravate the problems of ULB. The novel technologies for energy recovery such as incineration and pyrolysis should also be explored by the ULB. Apart from the landfilling, the ULB should encourage citizens to compost the biodegradable waste at community level to reduce the overall volume of waste to be disposed at dumping/landfill site.

The Rishikesh city is growing rapidly and therefore a strategic planning is needed to address the MSW management. Considering the importance of the city as tourist and pilgrimage site a good city sanitation plan is necessary in near future. The city sanitation plan should address the key issues identified above and consider the recently revamped MSW Management Rules (SWM Rules 2016) by Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India. The ULB should involve all the stakeholders such as citizens, local authority, public figures, public representatives (Member of Parliament, Member of Legislative Assembly etc.), representative from informal sectors, media representatives, representative from health department, NGOs for future planning of MSW management in the city. Each stakeholder can play a significant role in MSW management in the city. Considering the financial limitations of municipality, it is highly desirable that the ULB implement the public private partnership (PPP). In Indian scenario, the PPP model in MSW management has not been popularized so far and therefore, no success story can be cited [19]. ULB should organize the awareness programs in regular interval for the citizens where the importance of household waste segregation, household hazardous waste management, and their role in keeping the city clean should be addressed.