VISAKHAPATNAM: For the 90-year-old Andhra University (AU) charity doesn’t seem to begin at home. The authorities go gaga over the sanitation drive under the Swachh Bharat Mission, lack of adequate public toilets on the AU campus is resulting in defiling of open spaces.
Even students go behind the bushes and isolated areas to relieve themselves. Many students going on foot to the departments en route find it embarrassing.
With many departments either not maintaining the toilets well or are locked for the reasons best known to them, public and students who are on the campus are forced to relieve themselves in the open.
According to sources, motorists who move on the campus too are using public places for urination who have been warned many times by the security personnel.
Meanwhile, many students who visit the library, canteen or office find it difficult to locate a toilet. Despite many developments in the university, the AU has public toilets at the south campus near the examination centre. But no one has any idea about it. There are waiting halls for girls which are not maintained properly, besides most of the toilets in the departments are limited for use only by the department students and other times they are locked.
“While the faculty toilets are locked in some departments, even the student toilets in a few departments are also locked after every use, with the feeling that outsiders might use them,” said a AU student.
For 56 departments, there are only 70 sanitary staff. With the shortage of staff, two departments are being maintained by one staffer. “At least 150 sanitary staff are required to maintain toilets in all the departments. In some departments, it depends on the HoD who locks the toilets when not in use. Besides people do not know about the toilet in the south campus and there is also need for more public toilets,” said Thatha Rao, an employee of AU Security establishments.
Contacted, AU vice-chancellor G Nageswara Rao said: “We are yet to conduct survey and identify the places for setting up bio-toilets in the campus. We are planning to come up with bio-toilets in the current academic year.”