Encroachments on either side of Station Road in Patna. Picture by Ashok Sinha

The city is set to undergo an image makeover — from messy to spick and span.

The civic body and the district administration have embarked on a mission to remove encroachers, plastic and garbage from the streets to give them a clean look. Their joint anti-encroachment drive started from Boring Canal Road on Wednesday. It would cover Raja Bazaar, New Market and Hathwa Market among others in phases.

Sheshank Shekhar Sinha, the executive officer of the New Capital circle of Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC), told The Telegraph: “Acting on an order from the PMC commissioner, we started the anti-encroachment drive from the Boring Road area on Wednesday. Illegal vegetable and meat shops as well as a number of unauthorised street vendors were removed from the stretch between the Boring Road crossing and Rajapur Pul.”

The civic body officials boasted of their initiative but most of the anti-encroachment drives in the past have hardly borne any fruit. The squatters and vendors resurfaced a few hours after anti-encroachment drives.

“According to a directive of Patna High Court, the station house officer of the police station concerned has to ensure that the encroachers do not turn up again,” said a senior officer of the PMC.

The civic body officials have started a simultaneous drive against the use of poly bags, especially those below 40 microns. In the first phase, they are spreading awareness about the plastic waste rules among shopkeepers. “Once the drive is over, the sanitary inspectors would move around the shops to check the implementation of the rules,” said Sinha, the civic body officer.

In a bid to discourage people from using plastic bags, PMC commissioner Kuldip Narayan on Wednesday issued an order stating that poly bags should not be priced below Rs 5 per piece. On July 22, he had ordered the sanitary inspectors to ensure the name of the manufacturer and an indicative sign were printed on poly bags.

The civic body would also ensure that the shopkeepers and roadside vendors adhered to the order of Narayan to keep dustbins to prevent littering of roads. The defaulters would end up paying a penalty of Rs 100.