Bhubaneswar, Jan 23: The civic body will rope in volunteers of the National Service Scheme from various colleges in the city to spread the message of cleanliness among residents.
The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation has taken the decision just ahead of the second edition of the Swachh Survekshyan in which Bhubaneswar is competing with 499 cities of the country. To begin with, the civic body will sensitise students of city schools and colleges with the help of the NSS volunteers.
Citizen feedback is one of the key components in the upcoming cleanliness survey, which alone carries 600 marks out of a total of 2,000.
"A positive feedback has become essential from the part of our responsible citizens to keep the state capital ahead in the ranking," said mayor Ananta Narayan Jena.
The civic body has already held a meeting with Utkal University's NSS Cell in which coordinators of around 15 colleges had taken part and pledged to extend help to the initiative.
Environmentalist Sailabala Padhi welcomed the move and said: "It is a good move by the city administration to initiate the process from the ground level. There is a need for all-round support if the city wants to improve its rank on the cleanliness parameter."
The civic body has already made Swachhata Labs operational on various college campuses to create awareness among the youths on use of the Swachhata app. "We have already initiated the process to sensitise the citizens. Now, the NSS volunteers will act as goodwill ambassadors for promoting the activities of Swachh Bharat Mission," said Jena.
Last year, Bhubaneswar had taken part in the first edition of the national cleanliness survey and was ranked 24th among 73 competing cities. The city had then secured 434 marks out of an average total of 500 marks in the sanitation challenge. In the citizen's feedback section last year, 87 per cent said they had individual toilets while another 41 per cent confirmed that there was the provision of daily door-to-door garbage collection in the city. Like the previous year, the officials of the Union ministry of urban development will also come and take feedback directly from the citizens this year as well.
The communication cell of the civic body said people could call the toll-free numbers 1969 or 1800-111-969 or could visit the website of Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban) and cast their votes on various parameters.
"It seems that the civic body has suddenly woke up to make the city clean. I am surprised to see now that the sweepers are cleaning the main roads twice a day instead of the earlier practice of doing it only in the morning. I hope that the municipal officials continue this practice even once the survey is over. However, the way things are going now makes me sure that Bhubaneswar will get a better rank this year," said Rasulgarh resident Janmejaya Rath.
