Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday officially launched the 'Swachh Bharat Abhiyan' here at Rajpath.
Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari along with Union Urban Development, Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu were also present on this occasion.
Earlier Prime Minister Modi visited Valmiki Basti here in Gol Market area where he wielded the broom and interacted with the janitors present there. Before this, he paid floral tributes to Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi at Rajghat. The Prime Minister also visited Vijay Ghat to pay homage to former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri whose birth anniversary coincides with Mahatma Gandhi.
Cleanliness drive is on in Delhi and other parts of the country. Lakhs of Central government employees working across the country, will take a pledge of cleanliness in various public functions being organized today.
The nationwide Swachh Bharat campaign focuses on sanitation, hygiene and waste management.
The launch was preceded by cleanliness campaign week beginning September 25 which saw central government offices being spruced up by discarding or overhauling old furniture and sending old files to record rooms.
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Prime Minister Modi has been a keen votary of "Clean India", and has made several speeches on this regard.
Earlier in his Independence Day speech, Prime Minister Modi had talked of the Swachh Bharat campaign and called for India to be clean by October 2019, Mahatma Gandhi's 150th birth anniversary.
Recently, in his Madison Square address to about 20,000-odd Indian Americans, Prime Minister Modi's reference to this issue received a major shot in the arm, with India and the United States both agreeing to work together on this front.
