13 states, Union territories take central funds, but fail to get toilets

NEW DELHI: Despite a concerted push from the Centre to achieve Swachh Bharat targets, 13 states and Union territories including major ones such as Bihar, West Bengal, Kerala, Jharkhand and five north-eastern states are yet to build household and community toilets to address open defecation in urban areas since the mission was launched in October.

According to sources in the urban development ministry, though central assistance has been released to most of them during the last financial year, they have reported no construction of toilets.

Taking a serious view of the lack of initiative on the part of these states and UTs, Union urban development minister urban development M Venkaiah Naidu has directed his officials to take this up with the state representatives.

They added the assistance was released based on the assessment that the states had done and conveyed their requirement to the ministry. "No report of construction even after three months have passed since the last financial ended, shows how some states are lethargic to implement the scheme," a central government official pointed out.

TOI has learnt that states which have received good quantity of financial assistance under the Swachh Bharat Mission with major focus on building toilets and treating both solid and liquid waste include West Bengal (Rs 64 cr), Bihar (Rs 37.7 cr), Jharkhand (Rs 15.27 cr) and Kerala (Rs 19.18 cr).

Ministry sources said that between October last and this July, 4.36 lakh individual household toilets and another 22,419 community toilet seats have been constructed in urban areas.

"We are doing month-wise analysis of the progress in building toilets and processing of waste. Regular interactions are also being held to sensitize states to do better," said a ministry official.

Adding how processing of solid waste remains a big challenge, the official said that while 1.42 tonnes of waste was generated daily in July only 15.33 % of it was processed as against the target of 32% for March next year. Delhi reported waste generation of 8,590 tonnes per day and processing of 52% of it during the last month as against the target of 75% for March next year.