The Government is racing against time to ensure its ambitious ‘Swachchh Bharat Mission’ starts off at the ground level in urban areas across the States. The Union Urban Development Ministry has set a target of constructing 5,480 toilets every day as it intends to build over one crore toilets in the next five years.
However, it is wary that with more than half of the fiscal 2014-15 almost complete, there will not be much time left to receive proposals from States and release funds to them. There’s a feeling that this may result in a backlog which would impede the pace of construction.
The Ministry is also trying to find out ways to increase the budgetary allocation per toilet as it provides just one-third of what the Rural Development Ministry is providing in rural areas.
Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu on Wednesday in a meeting with his officials shared his concern noting that while the Mission has been launched with good initial impact, “the issue is how to sustain this, how to plan for identified outcomes and how to monitor and how to coordinate with States on a regular basis”.
In this connection, the States/UTs will be soon asked to prepare action plans for the next five years.
“We need to build 1,00,04,000 household toilets in urban areas. This amounts to building 5,480 toilets every day over the next five years. Are we equipped for this taskIJ How to get the States going on this to meet the target,” he asked.
The Minister also flagged the issue of huge differences in payment being doled out for toilets in rural and urban areas. While the RD Ministry is shelling out Rs12,000 each for construction of toilets in rural areas whereas the UD Ministry is giving only Rs4,000.
Indicating that he meant business, Naidu, who also holds the portfolio of Housing and Urban poverty Alleviation (HUPA), has directed the officials above the Joint Secretary level to meet regularly once a week. “This helps us in exchanging views on implementation issues, reviewing the progress and setting agenda for the next week,” he said.
The meeting was held to enquire into the time frames for the launch and implementation of the initiatives being undertaken by the new Government so far since it took over in May.“There is so much of commonality among Smart Cities, Housing for All, Swachchh Bharat Mission initiatives… We all need to have a focused approach to ensure that things move in time,” Naidu added.
On 100 Smart Cities project, Naidu wanted to know the fate of the concept paper released in September. Through the Smart City project, the Government aims at building the capacity of urban local bodies to achieve the goal of urban transformation.