BHUBANESWAR: Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi on Thursday urged residents of Bhubaneswar to take greater responsibility for keeping their neighbourhoods clean, saying collective participation will help the city move from its current ninth position in the national cleanliness ranking to the top.
Addressing a cleanliness drive organised by the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) at Khandagiri under the ‘Ek Din, Ek Ghanta, Ek Sath’ campaign, Majhi said cleanliness should not be limited to individual homes. “Just as we keep our homes, courtyards and premises clean, we need to expand our responsibility to the roads in front of our houses and colonies,” he said.
The chief minister appealed to the citizens to segregate wet and dry waste at source and hand it over to sanitation workers. He also urged people not to litter public spaces and discourage others from doing so.
Majhi said the Ek Din, Ek Ghanta, Ek Sath (One day, One hour, Together) initiative under the Swachhata Hi Seva campaign was an effort to involve society at large in maintaining cleanliness. The drive was part of the Seva Sankalp Abhiyan to mark the 76th birth anniversary of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Recalling Mahatma Gandhi’s emphasis on sanitation, Majhi said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had, since 2014, sought to turn cleanliness into a mass movement through the Swachhata Hi Seva campaign.
He also lauded the contribution of Safai Mitras (sanitation workers) to improve the cleanliness of Bhubaneswar and thanked them for their continuous service. He said the state government is committed to ensure their social security and provide them with housing.
Bhubaneswar and Puri have been selected among 50 cities across the country for development as ‘model sanitation cities’, he said and congratulated the civic authorities, officials and sanitation workers associated with the initiative.
Housing and Urban Development minister Krushna Chandra Mahapatra, Ekamra MLA Babu Singh, mayor Sulochana Das, former MLA Priyadarshi Mishra, social worker Jagannath Pradhan, BMC commissioner Chanchal Rana, and corporators, civic employees and sanitation workers attended the programme.
