India: Toilets being constructed under clean India initiative

APD NEWS

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By APD writer Rishika Chauhan

NEW DELHI, October 4 (APD) -

New toilets are being built across India under the aegis of the Clean India initiative.

However, many experts and leaders have criticized the manner in which toilet construction is being carried out across India, especially in Delhi.

Some of the toilets in New Delhi are being built near facilities that already exist but are no longer in use due to lack of maintenance.

A recent Hindustan Times report stressed that the “building frenzy is spurred by the city’s three municipal corporations ruled by leaders belonging to Prime Minister Modi’s Bharatiya Janta Party, which are allegedly hard-pressed to showcase their performance on the third anniversary of the government’s signature Clean India initiative— a mission to modernise sanitation in India.”

Some civic agencies in the capital had resolved to finish toilet construction by August this year, but the construction began a few weeks before October 2, when Clean India initiative was celebrated.

Speaking about toilet construction in Delhi, Rakesh Kumar, an opposition leader in the North Delhi Municipal Corporation said that construction of toilets started “hurriedly just for the Clean India campaign. The corporation should maintain existing toilets and make efforts to open unused ones instead of constructing more.”

However, some leaders are still trying to draw attention to the need to construct toilets in the country. Ved Pal, a leader who belongs to the Congress party said, “There are places such as Jonapur and Ghitorni, where there are no public toilets. More than one lakh (100,000) people live in these two areas. Repeated appeals to the civic officials have fallen on deaf ears.”

While a senior civic official clarified that mobile toilets are being provided in several areas and the municipal corporation will build some soon.

(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)