the goan I network
PANAJI
Even as 60,000 homes across the state do not have toilets, the state was declared Open Defecation Free (ODF) on Saturday.
A certificate issued by Gopal Parsekar, the mission director of the Swachch Bharat Mission for Goa declared both the North and South Districts, as well as each of the 12 talukas ODF.
According to information tabled in the monsoon assembly session, 60,000 houses in the state are without a toilet. However, only 19,000 of these families have applied for toilets. These are yet to be given to them.
Goa becomes the last state to be declared ODF, and with Goa being declared ODF, India now becomes cent per cent open defecation free... at least on paper, as the situation on the ground is quite the opposite.
Since the government did not have the time to provide for the thousands of toilets that needed to be installed before claiming the state was ODF, authorities have made provisions for public toilets before issuing the certificate to Goa.
Even the state’s capital city Panaji is far from becoming ODF in reality. City mayor Uday Madkaikar told The Goan on Saturday that an agreement had been signed with Sulabh International to set up 310 bio-toilets in the capital. Work on the same is likely commence by September 10, he disclosed.
Earlier in August at a press conference, Madkaikar had said that it would take at least another four months before the city was truly made
ODF.
The process of installing the toilets had been delayed with the excuse of the monsoons. A few remaining wards, especially Aivao in Dona Paula are expected to benefit from these bio-toilets. However, areas in the capital city which already have a community toilet are not going to get individual toilets, it had earlier been decided.
The situation is not much brighter in remaining parts of Tiswadi taluka, with several panchayats declaring themselves ODF even though they are far from it.
The Goan had reported earlier this week that while some panchayats had wilted under pressure from their higher ups, others had succumbed to political pressure.
The Chimbel panchayat, one of the first panchayats in Tiswadi to declare itself ODF, had done so even though it faces a real problem on the front.
A ground visit revealed that people were still answering nature’s call in the open even two days before the ODF deadline ended.
When the panch of that ward was questioned as to why his ward was declared ODF, he said he had no choice as everybody else had declared the same.
Another panch said that the panchayat peon came to his house and had him sign the declaration. He further said that when questioned about the same he was told that it is to declare that he has a toilet in his home.
A couple of sarpanchas had informed The Goan that they were under tremendous pressure to declare their villages as ODF so that the deadline of August 31 was met.
