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Overwhelmed by the response garnered by Nirmala Saulabhya, the nation’s first green public convenience facility atop Chamundi Hills, similar facilities have been planned for other tourist spots in and around the heritage city.
Saulabhya is an initiative of the Mysuru chapter of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), and supported by Automotive Axles who built the state-of-the-art green public convenience facility atop the hill with an intention to make Mysuru a tourist-friendly destination. Nirmala Saulabhya was inaugurated on October 1, 2016, by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah during a function organised to launch Dasara celebrations.
CII-Mysuru chairman N Muthukumar said, since its dedication, the public convenience facility, built at a cost of Rs 1 crore, has catered to more than one lakh tourists and devotees, visiting the Chamundi Hill, from across India and also abroad.
“We have received overwhelming response from the users, in terms of maintenance and the uniqueness of the facility. The Nirmala Saulabhya is carbon positive and water positive with 10 KLD water treatment plant and rainwater harvesting. Its salient features are: toilet facility for women, 15 Indian and two European; toilet facility for men, seven Indian and two European and 15 urinals; facility for physically-challenged persons, one European; facility for childcare; sensor-based handwash system; 5 kw rooftop solar power system; facility for RO drinking water, with a capacity for 200 litres per hour; re-using of treated water for flushing; low flow fittings to conserve water; LED lighting for energy conservation; and pressurised water pumping system,” he said.
Following the feedback that children need urinals at a lower level, Muthukumar has communicated that the CII will incorporate the changes immediately. “We will ensure that the facility for boys is part of the standard feature in future facilities,” he added.
He said, the CII has identified six to seven places where similar facilities can be extended and has expressed its interest to the district administration. “The district administration is expected to get back, after conducting the feasibility study as it has to provide the required land. A couple of corporates like the Volvo and Toyota have evinced interest in partnering with the CII-Mysuru to sponsor similar facilities. So, the projects will be executed shortly, on the basis of the experience of the first Nirmala Saulabhya,” Muthukumar said.
Devotees like Dasappa from Siddhartha Nagar in Mysuru, Lokesh from Hassan, Mamatha from Madurai, Deepa, a teacher from Pune and Satyender from New Delhi were happy with the maintenence of the facility.
Satyender, a financial analyst with Honeywell, said, a similar facility is maintained at the Golden Temple premises in Amritsar. “As a corporate social responsibility initiative, this is a good experiment. The information provided about tourist spots in Karnataka in the form of posters on the walls of the Nirmala Saulabhya is useful to visitors. It is a good example of cross-selling,” he said.