 "West Bengal launches its own Swachh Bharat Mission")
The West Bengal government brought all state-run sanitation projects under the Mission Nirmal Bangla, launched on October 2, 2014. While the Nirmal Bangla project draws financial support from the plans sanctioned to states under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, the state government has set its own targets and put administrative mechanism in place, leading to a healthy competition for cleanliness.
In less than a year, West Bengal has a reason to cheer. On April 30, Nadia became the first district in India to get the open defecation-free (ODF) status.
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Nadia launched an aggressive sanitation project in October 2, 2013, under the name Sobar Swachaghar or toilets for all. In about 18 months, nearly 347,000 toilets were built in the district. The plan, which has now become a showcase project of the state government, was carried out by the district administration with the help of Unicef.
“An intensive planning and monitoring system made Nadia sanitation project a success story. We involved multiple stakeholders, including SHGs and school children, which all created a peer pressure. There was strong monitoring system in place, through weekly review programmes and GIS monitoring. By March 2015, there were 109 sanitary marts,” said S N Dave, an UNICEF official in charge of the programme.
Taking Nadia as a model, UNICEF was engaged by the government to conceptualise and prepare a branding, and communication strategy, among other things, to launch the Nirmal Bangla Project along the same time when the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was launched.
Nationally, projects to build toilets were launched in 2000 under the Total Sanitation Campaign. In 2012, the Union government launched the Nirmal Bharat Programme, which entailed a subsidy of Rs 500 for building toilets. The subsidy was to be shared in 70:30 ratio between the Central and state governments. Subsequently, the subsidy element was raised to Rs 3,200 and then to Rs 10,000, available to people below poverty line. However, of the total subsidy of Rs 10,000, Rs 5,400 was to come from Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme funding.
In 2014, when the Central government launched the Swacha Bharat mission, the subsidy amount was increased to Rs 12,000. It also included new categories of beneficiaries, SC/ST, women-headed families, small and marginal farmers and families who have a physically-challenged person. Under Nirmal Bangla, 75 per cent of funding comes from the central government.
The Central government has set 2019 as the deadline to have a toilet in each household. But in West Bengal, the government has given each district the flexibility to declare its own deadline.
Thus, while Nadia has been declared ODF area in 2015, the state hopes four more districts to achieve a similar feat by 2016. At present, the state’s coverage of in sanitation programme is nearly 62 per cent in rural areas.
To celebrate the success of the efforts in Nadia, April 30 will be observed as Nirmal Bangla Divas across West Bengal