Bhubaneswar, Jan. 7: The state government plans to rope in non-government organisations to issue work orders for constructing household latrines and monitoring the projects.

The state housing and urban development department has decided to entrust the NGOs with the job instead of the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation after the civic body reportedly failed miserably to achieve the target on time.

As part of the Swachh Bharat Mission, the civic bodies issue work order worth Rs 5,333 for construction of these latrines in the houses of the beneficiaries.

The move is aimed at curbing the practice of open defecation.

The corporation had been asked to distribute work orders for construction of 15,208 latrines by March 2016 and another 19,596 by March 2017. However, the performance card of the civic body revealed that so far, only 1,924 work orders have been issued.

"The civic officials had come to our area in March last year and distributed around 100 work orders for construction of latrines, whereas the number of households in our area is much more. They should identify the beneficiaries properly," said Palasuni resident Gita Pradhan, adding that Rs 5,333 was also too less an amount to construct a latrine.

A senior official of the housing and urban development department said they had fixed a target to make Bhubaneswar free from open defecation by March 2018.

"It is a big task to identify beneficiaries, distribute work orders for the latrines and monitor its construction process for any single agency," said the official.

He said the civic body was not being able to do the work properly as it had to take care of "several other things". So, it was decided that the NGOs' help would be taken for speedy construction of the latrines in the slum areas.

"We will call upon the NGOs which will mobilise the slum dwellers and monitor the construction of the latrines as well," said the official, adding that there were also proposal to increase the incentive from Rs 5,333 to Rs 8,000.

Mayor Ananta Narayan Jena said their officials had identified 12 wards where open defecation was a major issue. "Our officials are conducting campaigns to make people aware about the environmental hazards of open defecation. The NGOs will help us further in achieving the target and making the city free from open defecation," said Jena.#

"There are a number of slums in the city where cleanliness is a major issue. The administration should focus on these areas if they want to do good in the national cleanliness survey," said Nayapalli resident Biraj Mishra.