Bhubaneswar: Frequent violation of faecal sludge management guidelines has alarmed the housing and urban development department so much that it has decided to organise sensitisation sessions for civic body officials.

The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation will take the lead in the Khurda region, where the workshop will be held on February 24 for civic officials of Jatni, Bhubane-swar, Banpur and Khurda.

At the workshop, a roadmap to implement the sludge management guidelines will be prepared. This will help achieve control over faecal contamination of water and halt adverse impact on the environment.

"Our objective is to improve the awareness level of officials on faecal sludge and septage management since they are the ones who will be implementing the guidelines on the ground," said a department official.

The civic body has failed to follow the several components of the guidelines. The corporation has failed to identify a separate dumping site for faecal sludge and control private cesspool operators who violate norms and dump the sludge in open drains.

"We have been planning to depute a separate team to monitor implementation of the guidelines. We have already drafted a sanitation plan with special focus on septage management. If required, we will take the help of private sanitation agencies," said mayor Ananta Narayan Jena.