JOIN US40 pc of households in dist still lack toilets
Open defecation continues to be one of the major concerns in the district, as more than 40 per cent of the 4.1 lakh households do not have toilets.
However, the Zilla Panchayat is hopeful that the gap will be bridged in the next three years.
According to a baseline survey conducted by the district administration in the year 2012, of the total of 4,10,734 households identified, only 1,71,889 households had toilets. During the past two years however, more than 60,000 toilets have been constructed.
P A Gopal, Zilla Panchayat CEO, said that after the survey the government had issued guidelines under Nirmal Bharath Abhiyan (Swacch Bharat Abhiyan) to ensure that all the remaining households have toilets within the next five years.
A target for the construction of 30,000 toilets was set for the year 2013-14, of which 29,175 toilets were constructed. For the year 2014-15, the target set by the government was 35,000, of which 32,180 had been completed by the end of February, he said.
Revised target
With several households in rural areas of the district eager to construct toilets, as the government was providing incentives for the construction of same, the Zilla Panchayat has set a target of 50,000 toilets for the year, he said.
After two years of the project, during which 61,355 toilets had been constructed, 1,77,490 households still do not have toilets. However, the Zilla Panchayat was hopeful that toilets will be constructed in those houses too in the next three years.
Open defecation free
Following efforts, 30 of the 2009 villages spread across 235 gram panchayats have now been declared open defecation free.
“The number of such villages was only about 1,000 in the State,” Gopal said. With the government providing Rs 15,000 for SC/STs and Rs 12,000 for BPL families for the construction of toilets, the number of villages which are open defecation free will improve further in the next few years. Karnataka topped the country in the number of toilets constructed, with Mysuru district standing fourth in the State.
Payment
To a question regarding the delay in payment of incentives for beneficiaries, Gopal said that several constraints about the same have been ironed out with the implementation of Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) systems.
“Earlier, there were complaints of Panchayat Development Officers (PDO) withholding payment. However, now all payments are being made directly to beneficiary accounts,” he said.
He said that the State government had released Rs eight crore recently as incentives for BPL families that have constructed toilets in the district.