wn

Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (English: Clean India Mission) is a campaign by the Government
of India to clean the streets, roads and infrastructure of the country's 4,041 statutory cities and
towns.[1][2][3] It includes ambassadors and activities such as run, national real-time monitoring
or spread of updated NGOs practices.

The campaign was officially launched on 2 October 2014 at Rajghat, New Delhi, by Prime
Minister Narendra Modi. It is India's largest ever cleanliness drive with 3 million government
employees, and especially school and college students from all parts of India, participating in
the campaign.

The objectives of Swachh Bharat are to reduce or eliminate open defecation through the
construction of individual, cluster and community toilets. The Swachh Bharat mission will
also make an initiative of establishing an accountable mechanism of monitoring latrine
use.The government is aiming to achieve an Open-Defecation Free (ODF) India by 2 October
2019, the 150th anniversary of the birth of Mahatma Gandhi, by constructing 12 million
toilets in rural India, at a projected cost of ₹1.96 lakh crore (US$30 billion).[4]

Background
Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is a campaign which was launched on 2 October 2014, and aims to
eradicate open defecation by 2019,[5] and is a national campaign, covering 4,041 statutory
cities and towns.[6][7] Its predecessors were the "Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan" and before that the
"Total Sanitation Campaign", see history section below.

Times of India reported that the idea was developed and initiated in March 2014 after a
sanitation conference was organised by Unicef India and the Indian Institute of Technology
as part of the larger Total Sanitation Campaign, which the Indian government launched in
1999.[8]

The government is aiming to achieve an Open-Defecation Free (ODF) India by 2 October

2019, the 150th anniversary of the birth of Mahatma Gandhi, by constructing 12 million
toilets in rural India, at a projected cost of ₹1.96 lakh crore (US$30 billion).[4][9] Prime
Minister Narendra Modi spoke of the need for toilets in his 2014 Independence Day speech
stating:

Has it ever pained us that our mothers and sisters have to defecate in open? Poor womenfolk
of the village wait for the night; until darkness descends, they can`t go out to defecate. What
bodily torture they must be feeling, how many diseases that act might engender. Can't we just
make arrangements for toilets for the dignity of our mothers and sisters?

Modi also spoke of the need for toilets in schools during the 2014 Jammu and Kashmir state
elections campaign stating:

When the girl student reaches the age where she realises this lack of female toilets in the
school she leaves her education midway. As they leave their education midway they remain
uneducated. Our daughters must also get equal chance to quality education. After 60 years of
independence there should have been separate toilets for girl students in every school. But for
the past 60 years they could not provide separate toilets to girls and as result the female
students had to leave their education midway.[10]

As of May 2015, 14 companies including Tata Consulting Services, Mahindra Group and
Rotary International have pledged to construct 3,195 new toilets. As of the same month, 71
public sector undertakings in India supported the construction of 86,781 new toilets.[11]

Most of these toilets are a type of pit latrine, mostly the twin pit pour flush type.[citation needed]

Hundreds of thousands of Indian people are still employed as manual scavengers in emptying
buckets and pit latrines.[12][13][14]

Finance
The programme has also received funds andtechnical support from the World Bank,
corporations as part of corporate social responsibility initiatives, and by state governments
under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan schemes.[9]
Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is expected to cost over ₹620 billion (US$9.6 billion).[3][15] The
government provides an incentive of ₹15,000 (US$230) for each toilet constructed by a BPL
family.[4] Total fund mobilised under Swachh Bharat Kosh (SBK) as of 31 January 2016
stood at ₹3.69 billion (US$57 million).[16] An amount of ₹90 billion (US$1.4 billion) was
allocated for the mission in the 2016 Union budget of India.[6]

Government and the International Monetary Fund signed a US$1.5 billion loan agreement on
30 March 2016 for the Swachh Bharat Mission to support India's universal sanitation
initiative. The International Monetary Fund will also provide a parallel $25 million in
technical assistance to build the capacity of select states in implementing community-led
behavioural change programmes targeting social norms to help ensure widespread usage of
toilets by rural households.[5]

Performance
dore

Between April 2014 and January 2015, 3,183,000 toilets were built. Karnataka led all States
in construction of toilets under the programme.[9] As of August 2015, 8 million toilets have
been constructed under the program.[29] As of 27 October 2016, 56 districts in India were
ODF.[4] In January 2017, Indore city as well as rural areas were announced open defecation
free by the central government.[30][31]

Plans
The Ministry of Railways is planning to have the facility of cleaning on demand, clean bed-
rolls from automatic laundries, bio-toilets, dustbins in all non-AC coaches.[32] The Centre
may use its Digital India project in conjunction with the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan to have
solar-powered trash cans, such as those in many US cities, which send alerts to sanitation
crew once they are full.[33]
The Government has appointed PWD with the responsibility to dispose off waste from
Government offices

t offices.[34]

Other activities
Run

A Swachh Bharat Run was organized at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the official home of the
President of India, located Rajpath, New Delhi, on 2 October 2014. According to a statement
from the Rashtrapati Bhavan around 1500 people participated and the event was flagged off
by President Pranab Mukherjee. Participants in the run included officers[vague] and their
families.[35]

 The Times of India published an article on how "Desi companies beat Facebook in 'Swachh'
apps race".[36]

Real-time monitoring

The government will be launching a nationwide real-time monitoring system for toilets
constructed under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. For this the government of India is bringing
awareness to the people through advertisements. With this system, the government aims to
attain a fully open defecation free India by 2019.[37]

As of 30 November 2016, Total Sanitation Coverage throughout India has risen to 57.56% up
from 42.02% in 2 October 2014, the day Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was launched.[38]

Updates from NGOs

With growing interest in the progress of the mission, both private companies[citation needed] as
well as government started releasing progress reports. The Swachh Bharat app Tumblr
feed[39] provides updates from individual groups, corporations and Twitter users in general
about group cleaning events, the status of cleanliness across India, and opinions on the
objectives of the Clean India mission.[original research?] A recent study by the Public Affairs
Centre finds that participation of beneficiaries in their toilet construction ensures better
usage.[40]