In Madhya Pradesh, 4.5 lakh Swachh toilets disappear in Rs 540-crore scam

BHOPAL: More than 4.5 lakh Swachh loos have been flushed into oblivion in Madhya Pradesh, along with the Rs 540 crore it took to “build” them. The toilets may never be found — though the administration has GPS-tagged photographs of each of them — but the government aims to recover every paisa spent on them.

The toilets were supposed to have been built — at least on paper — between 2012 and October 2018. But they don’t exist. Officials believe the photos submitted as proof of Swachh toilet construction were actually clicked elsewhere, perhaps at neighbours’ homes.

Some villagers blew the whistle in Betul’s Lakkadjam panchayat and complained to officials. A probe found that four Swachh beneficiaries were not even aware that toilets have been built in their name. On government records, not only do their homes have toilets but the government portal has pictures of them before loos as well. Officials found that all four were photographed in front of a neighbour’s toilet.


“For these toilets and other similar anomalies, a recovery of Rs 7 lakh was imposed on the accused. They appealed against the recovery order, but the penalty was upheld. Once recovery is done, we will initiate action under IPC. I have ordered investigation of all the other work done in the panchayat,” chief executive officer of Betul panchayat ML Tyagi told TOI.

It set alarm bells ringing and the panchayat and rural development department has since identified 4.5 lakh such missing ‘paper toilets’ across the state. In monetary terms, toilets worth Rs 540 crores are missing, said an official.

“In 2012, a survey was conducted and 62 lakh above-poverty-line households without toilets were identified in the state. On October 2, 2018, construction was complete. But to ensure that these toilets are actually present and 100% complete, we conducted a survey and physical verification using 21,000 volunteers. During the survey, around 4.5 lakh toilets were found to be missing,” deputy director of Swachh Bharat Mission (Rural) Ajit Tiwari, said.