Just after a year and a half after the launch of the Swachh Bharat Mission, five towns of Maharashtra and also Telangana have been declared as Open Defecation Free (ODF) by an independent survey, which was conducted by the Quality Council of India.
Moreover, the urban development ministry targets to make 974 towns as free from the open defecation by next year.
Kagal, Vengurla, Murgud, Panchgani, and Panhala in Maharashtra and then Siddipet, Suryapet, Shadnaga, Achampet and Huzurnagar in Telangana have also been certified as Open Defecation Free towns.
Altogether 141 towns in the seven states have claimed to be ODF, which also includes 100 in Maharashtra alone. All these claims are further under verification.
The report received by the ministry from the states, have also suggested that 974 towns will become ODF by next year. But, this is beside the 10 towns certified so far, four towns of Gujarat are claiming ODF status, which includes Gandhidham, Rapar, Navsarai, and Mandavi.
Moreover, six other towns from Telangana including the Gajwel, Madhira, Jagtiyal, Ibrahimpatnam, Sattupalli and Sircilla also aspire to make to this list.
On the hand, ten towns in West Bengal are also claiming the elimination of Open Defecation including Nabadwip, Santipur, Krishananagar, and Kalyani. Other ODF claims are from Ambikapur, Dhamtari and Ambagarh Chowki in Chattisgarh, Dungarpur in Rajasthan and Mairang and Kakching in Manipur.
The progress has been constantly monitored by the urban development ministry. As per the Protocol for third party verification and the certification of ODF status- each Ward and City first self-declares as ODF and on intimation of the same by the respective Urban Local Body or State, the Ministry also gets such claims verified in 30 days by the third party.
