Approximately 48,000 schools across the State that include Government schools, Government aided schools, private schools functioning in rural and urban belts this year will fight for the coveted ‘Swacchta’ awards.
The programme being organised under the aegis of the ambitious Swaach Bharat Abhiyaan (SBA) aims to inculcate behavioural change among the participants and is one of the prime components of the sanitation challenge. According to the Ministry of Human Resource, GoI, participation of all schools have been made mandatory.
The schools gearing up for the contest have to fill the Self Assessment Forms (SAF) based on the questionnaire format. The ratings will be done on the basis of availability of toilets, drinking water facilities, hand-wash stations, operation and maintenance of toilets, organisation of regular capacity building programmes to create awareness among kids.
“By October 30, the registration must be done. After giving a missed call on 070972-98093, the school will get registered. The concerned person has to fill up the survey form in a prescribed format,” said Ranchi District Education Officer (DEO), Ratan Mahavar while sharing the details of the competition.
Also, Mahavar said that after submitting the form, a password will be send to the registered mobile number given by the school in the primary information section. Schools will then have to login with the U-DISE code and complete other segments of the survey divided in six sections. Only after uploading actual photographs as per the format, the procedure will get complete and accordingly schools be graded on the set parameters.
As per the notice released recently by Department of School Education and literacy, merely 14,380 schools in 2016 participated in the sanitation contest programme. Following the Ministry of Human Resource Development (HRD) guidelines around 48,888 schools are likely to compete with each other this year. However, inclusion of private cradles has emerged as a biggest challenge for government schools to prove their worth on cleanliness meter.
“The initiative launched by the Ministry of HRD in 2014 aims that all schools must have access to separate functional toilets for boys and girls. The scheme also acts as a catalyst in promoting safe and appropriate hygiene practices in schools including behavioral change among children. It is a good opportunity for the government schools to prove their mettle in sanitation challenge,” Mahavar said.
“Also, district wise awareness programmes regarding the sanitation contest are being organized to develop a sense of competition among everyone associated with government schools. Government schools are gearing up to give tough competition to private schools,” added Ranchi DEO.
The progress report of ‘Swacch Vidyalaya’ award 2016-17 suggests 226 schools have uploaded the photographs by far out of which140 schools have been considered under final submission category.
Notably, the ‘Swachh Vidyalaya’ award was instituted by the Ministry of HRD, GoI in 2016 to recognise, inspire and celebrate excellence in sanitation and hygiene practice in schools. The primary purpose of the award is to admire and recognise schools that have undertaken significant steps towards promoting healthy sanitation practices apart fulfilling the mandate of the ‘Swachh Vidyalaya’ campaign.