Seven non-BJP States — Bihar, Kerala, Tripura, Meghalaya, Arunanchal Pradesh, Assam and West Bengal — have not yet constructed a single household toilet under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet project Swachchh Bharat Mission, which was launched last year in October.
Incidentally, even the BJP-ruled Jharkhand and Nagaland, where the BJP is in power with the Congress, have not performed.
Among the Union Territories — Andaman and Nicobar, lakshadweep, Dadar and Nagar Haveli and Daman & Diu — also are yet to take initiatives to build the toilets in houses, said sources in the Urban Development Ministry.
In fact, Haryana, Mizoram and Manipur too have been too late to kick-off the building of the toilets, reporting for the first time construction of loos in households only in July this year.
Besides, according to the UD Ministry data, 10 States and Union Territories are still to start processing of solid waste, an essential component of the ‘Clean India’ drive. These are Assam, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Daman amd Diu, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Jharkhand, Nagaland, Sikkikm, Tripura and West Bengal.
Taking a serious view of the lack of initiative on the part of these States and UTs, the Urban Development Minister, Venkaiah Naidu has directed the officials to find out the reasons for the same and to ensure necessary momentum, the sources said.
Overall, 4,35,805 household toilets, 22,419 community and public toilet seats have been constructed in urban areas since the launch of the Mission that aims to make the country open defecation free by 2019.
During July this year, 52,473 household toilets and 3,786 community and public toilet seats were constructed in urban areas while 100% door-to-door collection of solid waste has been achieved in 2,562 wards.
lead performers in building household toilets during the last month include Gujarat which constructed 33,670 toilets, accounting for 64 per cent of the total toilets built in urban areas of the country followed by Madhya Pradesh (7244), Punjab (5677), Karnataka (1845), Haryana (1829), Chattisgarh(1676), Mizoram (300), Rajasthan (167), Manipur (41) and Uttarakhand (22).
The Mission targets in urban areas include construction of 1.04 crore individual household toilets, over 5 lakh community and public toilet seats and 100 per cent door-to-door collection of solid waste, its transportation and disposal, to be achieved by the year 2019. This Mission in urban areas is being implemented at a cost of `62,000 crore.