Three years after launching the Swachchh Bharat Mission (SBM), the Government is set to conduct a massive survey covering 92,000 households in 4,626 villages across the country to assess the actual coverage of the cleanliness campaign. An additional 200 villages, located on the banks of Ganga, will also be surveyed for the purpose.
The survey, to be conducted by the Quality Council of India (QCI), will cost the Government Rs3.80 crore.
According to the Union Water and Sanitation Ministry, at least 3.32 crore toilets have been built and as many as 1.7 lakh villages have become free from open defecation since October 2014 when the SBM was launched.
The QCI had been conducting such surveys for the Urban Development Ministries too. It had conducted the ‘Swachh Survekshan’, survey for the Ministry for performance of the SBM, launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 2nd October in 2014.
There are a total 5,169 villages under 1,651 gram panchayats (GPs) in 52 districts of five States — Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal — from where the Ganga river flows through.
With just two years left to meet the deadline of year 2019 to make the country ODF, the Ministry has also engaged a number of Institutional National level Monitors (NlMs), for the assessment of ODF status of the villages under Namami Gange districts in Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhandand West Bengal States in the country. These representatives from 29 NlMs have been asked to visit the selected villages in districts.
According to various studies more than setting up the toilets what is needed is behaviour change to make the country ODF.
For instance, a study conducted by the Global Sanitation Fund in the States of Jharkhand, Odisha and Maharashtra has found that a number of villagers have gone back to defecating in the open despite having toilets at home.
“Social, religious and cultural barriers remain, and the absence of adequate toilet-related behaviour change has left the constructed toilets abandoned. Though women and children preferred using toilets at home, the study found that using latrines as a norm has not yet penetrated in most villages.
Union Minster for Rural Development Narendra Singh Tomar had recently said that a total 91 districts in the country were declared ODF. “Total 91 districts, including 1,56,219 villages, have been declaredOpen Defecation Free. Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala and Sikkim have already become ODF states,” he said.