Odisha targets to turn total open defecation free by 2017

Bhubaneswar: Odisha government has set the target to become a total Open Defecation Free (ODF) and asked all District Collectors today to work to achieve the goal between December, 2016 and December, 2017.

The Collectors have also been asked to make at least five to 15 gram panchayats open defecation free by August 15, 2015 and one block by October, 2015.

Chief Secretary G C Pati asked the Collectors during a video conference during the day to focus on behavioural and attitudinal changes of the people towards toilet and sanitary practices.

Pati also directed Collectors to adopt Community Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) approach and ensure active participation of volunteers, village community, SHGs and individual beneficiaries in carrying forward the campaign.

Rural Development secretary P K Mohapatra asked the Collectors to take up construction of toilets in saturation mode so that blocks can be made open defecation free one after another.

He also directed executive engineers of Rural Water Supply and Sanitation of all districts to achieve targets within scheduled time and warned that failure to do so would be viewed seriously.

 The state government has fixed construction of 20 lakh toilets under rural sanitation campaign and accordingly targets have been fixed for districts as per preliminary base line survey, he said.

A total 1500 CLTS volunteers have been trained and engaged in various districts. Each panchayat will be given one trained volunteer to help it, Mohapatra said.

Chief Executive Officer, State Water & Sanitation Mission, Abhaya Biswal said steps are being taken to get Unicef and DFID support for success of the ODF campaign.

Steps are being taken to declare Deogarh, Boudh and Sonepur total open defecation free by March, 2016, Biswal added.