Sanitation workers in Patna will be talking on walkie-talkies to share updates on cleanliness and sweep roads with state-of-the-art machines.

The agency, which has been hired by Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC) to ensure cleanliness in and around the city for Prakash Utsav (the 350th birth anniversary celebration of Guru Gobind Singh), will be indulging in technical smartness.

Divisional commissioner Anand Kishor and PMC commissioner-in-charge Shirsat Kapil Ashok on Thursday inaugurated the services of the agency, which is going to work for the coming 45 days (till January 15).

The private agency will look after the cleanliness work of roads around Gandhi Maidan and it would also ensure sanitation on Ashok Rajpath apart from Malsalami to Didarganj. Sources said the agency has been asked to ensure cleanliness on all the Prakash Utsav related routes. "When the PMC sent out tenders, it had mentioned about the latest sanitation equipment that it wanted the agency to use for cleanliness. Apart from having the latest equipment, the sanitation workers are using walkie-talkies for communication and had uniforms on so that people could identify them," said Kishore, adding that the agency had supervisors and managers to monitor the work.

On why the PMC was depending on a private agency to keep the city clean during the big festival, Kishor admitted that the PMC was not able to keep the city clean with its own resources because of which it decided to engage a private agency. "It's an international event and we don't want to take any risk," he said.

Sources said there are around 3,500 sanitation workers of the PMC, including those on contract and regular, will be engaged in the city. The private agency was engaging around 850 sanitation workers, including supervisors and managers.

"The outsourcing agency will engage separate teams in three shifts - 6am to 2pm, 2pm to 10pm and 10pm to 6am. All are being provided separate uniforms and different coloured identity cards so that they could be identified. Apart from roads around Gandhi Maidan, Ashok Rajpath, Malsalami to Didarganj, the private agency will focus on the cleanliness work in ward number 62 (in which the Bal Leela Gurdwara falls), ward number 66 (Takht Sri Harmandir Sahib) and ward number 67 (Patna Sahib Junction area) and Guru Gobind Singh link road and NH-30 link road," said Ajay Kumar, the executive engineer of Patna City circle of the PMC.

He added: "The private agency will also engage two road-sweeping machines worth Rs 40 lakh each. We don't have the state-of-the-art sanitation machine though a few urban local bodies in other districts have it. The municipal corporation in metros have it too," he added.

Ajay said the PMC has asked the agency to collect trash from designated zones and dump it in the bins being used by PMC.