The Quality Council of India (QCI) has declared Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) open defecation free during its visit early this month. The civic body has achieved this feat by constructing over 100 community and public toilet across the city.
As part of the Cleanliness Survey 2017, members of QCI visited the city for inspection of works done by the city body to make the city clean. Civic chief Tukaram Mundhe said, “During the visit, the QCI declared NMMC open defecation free and this we have achieved by setting up additional toilets across the city.”
Apart from setting up additional toilets, the civic body also came down heavily on people who were found defecating in the open. In the last one year, the civic body collected over Rs 5 lakh fine from people for defecating in the open. The civic body even increased the fine from Rs 400 to Rs 1200 for open defecation which received flak from public representatives.
Around 100 new toilets were set up which include public toilets, community toilets and e-toilets. E-toilets were set up along important roads like Palm Beach road and Thane Belapur road.
The Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) is putting in a lot of effort to score in the Cleanliness Survey 2017.
The Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD) had started the Cleanliness Survey in 2016 and ranked 73 cities on cleanliness and other aspects of urban sanitation across the country. On the same lines, MoUD has initiated “Swachh Survekshan” 2017 which conducted a survey to rank 500 cities of India. The performance evaluation of the Swachh Survekshan is conducted by Quality Council of India (QCI), an autonomous body established by Government of India in 1997 for Quality assurance in all spheres of activities including Governance.
There are three parts of the Survey. In the first part, which comprises 900 marks, the data will be provided by the civic body. In the second part of the survey, data collection will be done through direct observation and independent assessment which has 500 marks.
The civic body has already received applause from the QCI in this stage. The third part requires participation of citizens in the cleanliness drive and their feedback which contains 600 marks. The final ranking will be done based on marks obtained from all three parts.
