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Our Correspondent
Imphal, March 28 (EMN): Manipur’s Senapati district bordering Nagaland has been declared the first Open Defecation Free (ODF) district of the north-eastern state.
The Public Health Engineering department (PHED) minister Losii Dikho declared this during a function held at Senapati district headquarters, 60 km north of the state capital on March 27 an official sources said on March 28.
The flagship program of the government has been achieved because of the cooperation and participation from the people of the district, said the minister while appealing the people to maintain cleanliness stating that Senapati District can be categorized among the most progressive district in Manipur.
Congratulating the water and sanitary committee members in achieving the milestone, PHED Secretary Nidhi Kesarwani informed that the government is funding for solid liquid management project for ODF villages so that garbage can be processed and disposed scientifically.
District Deputy Commissioner Athem Muivah also spoke on the occasion. The total number of villages in Senapati District which have declared ODF are 136 including 20 in Paomata, 27 in Purul, 89 in Mao- Maram sub-divisions.
Though there is a saying that people in Manipur have a proper sanitation system, none of its districts except Senapati is declared ODF district in the state so far.
Official documents regarding Swachh Bharat Mission(Gramin) on Manipur shows that overall SBM coverage in the state was 52.16 per cent in 2014, when the mission was first launched, the state increased its coverage to 80.50 per cent during the current year.
SBM is another flagship programme of the central government and under 4,47,789 rural individual households, 3919 government schools, 1201 Angawadis of the state are to be provided sanitary latrine by October 2, 2019.
The report also shows that so far 3,41,652 number of individual household latrines (76.30% completed) has been covered by March 2017,leaving a balance of 1,06,137 numbers of households without toilets.
But ODF has also become an issue in Manipur in view of the existing dysfunctional toilets numbering around 40,482 in the state, according to the official sources.
“Until and unless these dysfunctional toilets are to be made functional, achieving ODF in the state will not be possible,” says the official document of the state Public Health Engineering Department which had been implementing SBM. “For this sanctioning of Rs 48.57 crores under Swachh Bharat Kosh by Ministry of drinking water and sanitation is still awaited.”
Otherwise the target of attaining Swachh Manipur by October 2 2019 is well within our reach and the department is trying relentlessly to achieve the status of ODF much earlier to set target, the source added. Other than Manipur, there are other states like Goa, Bihar, Odisha, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Puducherry figure low in the country’s ODF list.