Minister for Rural Development and Panchayat Raj H K Patil has said that Udupi district and around 1,000 villages across the State will be declared free of open defecation on January 26, 2015.
Speaking after inaugurating a media symposium on sanitation at Vidhana Soudha, he said that the RDPR department had drawn up a project to construct 20 lakh public toilet-cum-bathrooms in rural areas across the State.
The State has also sought financial assistance from the Centre to implement the project. The minister said that it had been planned to declare about 10,000 villages in the State free of open defecation by August next year.
Published 20 November 2014, 20:05 IST