Berhampur: The civic body has received a boost - in terms of tweets from Bollywood celebrities - in its efforts to make the city open-defecation free.
The Berhampur Municipal Corporation has set a target to become open-defecation free area by December, and it received a shot in the arm after Suniel Shetty, Shreyas Talpade and Remo D'souza tweeted to residents to extend their help to keep the city clean.
Shetty, in his 39-second video message on @BrahmapurCorp - the Berhampur Municipal Corporation's Twitter handle, requested all the "beautiful" people of Berhampur to use proper toilets to keep the city clean. The veteran Bolly actor urged residents to make Berhampur open-defecation free, which would ward off contaminating diseases, by this year.
Talpade, who starred in several big-banner Bollywood films such as Golmaal Returns, Housefull 2 and Great Grand Masti, requested Berhampur residents to co-operate with the municipal corporation in making the city open-defecation free. Race 3 director Remo D'Souza also requested the people to keep the city clean.
The appeals have also impressed Berhampur residents. "Suniel Shetty is my favourite action hero, and I welcome his message. But, the people, who do not use toilets, also don't know how to use Internet. They should make posters with pictures of these stars with the message translated into Odia and paste it on the walls at various places to make the general public aware," said science academy director Barnali Baisakhi.
Sanjib Mohan Palo, an insurance surveyor, said open defecation was a big problem in the city. "The attempt will not affect the grassroots. The authorities must try to impress the parents through their kids."
Pabana Das, a rickshaw puller from Bijipur, said: "We don't have a house to live in. We can't use public toilets as a group of people restrict us. We can only opt for open defecation. We don't bother who says what." Municipal commissioner Chakravarty Singh Rathore, who personally requested the stars to tweet their messages, thanked them for the response.
