The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is a unique initiative of the government of India which was started on 2nd October 2014 with a view to make India open defecation free by 2nd October 2019. There were several objectives the campaign was working on like eradication of open defecation, open dumping, segregation of wastes etc. The campaign was taken positively by Indians and its effect could be seen almost every village and district of India.
Every government, Non-government and private owned organisations worked on their level to promote cleanliness by teaching, training and various cleanliness drives.
Even many famous Bollywood stars, cricket stars, personalities belonging to other sports and fields participated in the cleanliness drive to show their interest and to motivate their followers to do so.
Important Facts and Figures of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan
The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was launched only for five years but during this period, it went through many ups and downs but the support and interest of the people in such a massive cleanliness drive made the campaign to pass every obstacle that came into its path. We are providing here some important facts and figures of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan so that you can the overview of the whole event in a very short span of time.
Main Points about Swachh Bharat Mission
- The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was launched with a sanitary run organised at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi on 2nd October 2014.
- The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was implemented in whole India in two parts as Swachh Bharat Abhiyan Rural and Swachh Bharat Abhiyan Urban.
- The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan in Rural areas is operated by the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation.
- The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan in Urban areas is operated by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.
- Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is actually restructured Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan implemented in the previous government.
- The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is seen as the largest cleanliness program in India by now with over three million government employees and students participating in the cleanliness drives.
- The chief objectives if Swachh Bharat Abhiyan were to remove the open defecation by constructing 9 million toilets, effective waste management, proper removal of open dumping, recycling me plastic waste and segregation of solid, liquid and dry wastes etc.
- Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was estimated to cost about 62 thousands crore.
- Under the Mission, a family constructing the household toilets would be provided an assistance of Rs. 12000 by the Government.
- Central Public Works Department was appointed for disposal of the wastes from government officials.
- A small cleanliness drive ‘Bal Swachhta Abhiyan’ was launched under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan to include students and teachers in the cleanliness activities.
- Many famous Indian personalities like Sachin Tendulkar, Amitabh Bachchan, Akshay Kumar, Shipa Shetty, Sourav Ganguly, Pawan Kalyan, Shivlal Yadav etc. are appointed the brand ambassador of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- A Swachh Survekshan Survey is also conducted every year to monitor the growth of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- A large part of the population of India was provided with community toilets and public toilets under this campaign.
- The campaign also focused on converting insanitary latrines into sanitary latrines.
- A ‘Plastic Waste Management Campaign’ was also launched as a part of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan which was completely aimed at elimination of plastic waste from India.
- The first half of October (1st October to 15th October) is decided to be celebrated as “Swachhta Pakhwada” every year as a part of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- Many state governments have launched some supportive campaigns to promote cleanliness in their states like ‘My Waste My Responsibility’ by the Kerala Government, ‘Chakachak Pune’ by Pune Municipality etc.
- Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh have performed very well in cleanliness under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- A ‘Swachhta Udyami Yojana’ was also launched under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan to provide employment and assistance to Safai Karmacharis and Manual Scavengers.
- ‘Swachh Bharat Kosh’ is set up to encourage the Non-Governmental and Private organisations to donate for the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- St Albert’s college in Ernakulam, Kerala organised a cleanliness drive in March 2019 named “I Challenge Plastic” to reduce plastic waste.
- Indore in Madhya Pradesh is declared as the cleanest city by Swachh Survekshan Survey 2019 under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh, is declared as the cleanest capital in India under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- Ahmadabad of Gujarat with population more than 10 lakh is the cleanest big city under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
- Ujjain of Madhya Pradesh is the cleanest medium city as declared by Swachh Survekshan Survey 2019.
- NDMC (New Delhi Municipal Corporation) is the cleanest small city under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan in India.
- A ‘Swachh Bharat-Swachh Vidyalaya’ campaign was also organised for the duration of 36 days starting from 5th September 2014 to 31st October 2014.
- The Swachh Bharat-Swachh Vidyalaya was aimed at teaching students the benefit of clean water and sanitation.
- Himanchal Pradesh Government has banned the use of plastic by the mountaineers while escalating.
- Haryana Government has issued a slogan “No toilet, No bride” to promote cleanliness and pursue people to construct household toilets.
- The Prime Minister has reportedly said many times that the main objective of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is not to bring a structural change in human’s life but the behavioural changes are the main objective of the mission.
- An app naming “Swachhta” is also launched by the government by which one can understand the motive of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan and also can participate in various cleanliness drives around them.
- Swachh Bharat Abhiyan has improved the condition of Tourism in India which has helped in generating employment and boosting the GDP of the nation.
- A healthy environment will help increasing the productivity of the people and will have slight rise in PCI (Per Capita Income).
- The Prime Minister Narendra Modi is awarded with ‘Global Goalkeeper Award’ by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
These are several important and memorable facts and figures about the greatest cleanliness campaign in India “Swachh Bharat Abhiyan”. We have tried to write down every single fact regarding the topic. There is yet a lot to know about the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan which has proved milestone for the whole world.
As an Indian, we should understand that this cleanliness campaign is only for us and we are asked to clean the garbage that we have spread so there should be no shame felt in cleaning our own garbage. It is our responsibility to clean our neighbourhood, our society, our city, state and our India as no Prime Minister or any other celebrity is going it to do for us. So understand your responsibility and pick up the broom to promote the cleanliness in your free times.