As the Government sets out on its ambitious mission to clean the Ganga River, for which budgetary allocations of over Rs 2,000 crore have been made, it has found out that nearly 15 lakh households, 600 schools and 6,000 anganwadis spread across 1,500 gram panchayats in 220 blocks of 46 districts situated along the banks of the holy river in four States have no toilet facilities and community sanitary complexes.
With defecation being a major cause of pollution in the river, which is also a key source of drinking water, the Government has prepared a time-bound draft action plan envisaging toilet facilities in at least half of the households along the river stretch by December this year.
While a fresh baseline survey is currently on in the river-basin States of Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh to identify more such households by July 15, the Union Water and Sanitation Ministry has in the meantime asked all the four States to make the area within 15 metres of the high flood level of the 1,500-mile-long sacred river and its tributaries “open-defecation free”.
Part A of the draft action plan focuses on the number of gram panchayats, households and schools besides anganwadis which need sanitation facilities. Part B details the future action that the States need to take in a time-bound manner to improve the sanitation situation. A senior official from the Ministry said that the draft is being shared with the States after which it will be submitted to the Prime Minister’s Office.
“In the absence of toilets and proper sanitation facilities, the locals of these gram panchayats are defecating as-well-as bathing and washing clothes along the river, causing untold pollution. This has to be checked urgently if we want to make Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet project ‘Namami Ganga’ a reality,” the official added.
In the second phase, a mass awareness campaign would be held at these gram panchayats to maintain hygiene and make the Ganga pollution free. “From August 1, the campaign will be launched focusing on making the residents aware and conscious of the need to construct and use toilets. The help of NGOs and the villagers would be taken for house-to-house visits,” the official said adding that the funds will be provided by the States under the ‘Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan’.
As per the draft action plan, by September this year, the Ministry will initiate steps to ensure sewage liquid waste management activities in 50 per cent of the identified gram panchayats in each district. By December, the Ministry aims to cover all the houses, schools and anganwadis. And, by January 1, 2015, it plans to be ready for third-party monitoring of the activities.
The corporate sector can extend its help under the corporate social responsibility commitment for release of funds, said the official.
Moreover, to meet the fund needs, the Modi Government, in its maiden Budget a couple of days ago, has announced Rs 2,037 crore for rejuvenating the river this fiscal year. An Rs 100-crore project is dedicated to ghat development and waterfront beautification while a ‘NRI Ganga fund’ has been announced to help drive fund collection, the money from which will be spent on ‘special projects’.
The over 2,500-km-long Ganga flows through one of the most populated regions of the Indo-Gangetic plains, supporting a population of more than 40 crore, almost a third of the country’s total. More than Rs 5,000 crore has been spent on cleaning the Ganga in the past 28 years with no substantial results.