Chandigarh, 23 August: In a major achievement for the state Fatehgarh Sahib District of Punjab has achieved the first rank in the country under the regular monitoring of Mission Swach and Swasth of the Government of India.
Disclosing this here today a spokesperson of the Punjab government said that in order to make the country clean and healthy by the year 2019, the Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation, GoI was carrying out regular monitoring of the states under Mission Swach and Swasth to promote a healthy competition amongst all the states to provide potable water and sanitation to the people. Based on these daily monitoring, two districts of Punjab viz. Fatehgarh Sahib and Barnala have bagged first and ninth position under this mission. The best performer districts would be felicitated by the Prime Minister on coming October 2 at a function in New Delhi. Both these districts have been showing exemplary performance and the Water Supply and Sanitation was trying its best to replicate this performance in other districts of the state also, added the spokesperson.
Meanwhile expressing satisfaction over the performance of these districts at the national level, the Water Supply and Sanitation Minister Punjab Mr. Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa has underlined the need for laying more thrust on border districts of Amritsar, Ferozepur, Gurdaspur and Pathankot under this scheme. The Minister has directed the officers to review the entire situation in these districts and submit a detailed status report to him, regarding the restarting of closed schemes, bringing the villages under the scheme to provide 12 to 24 hours water supply, construction of toilets in villages and making these districts open defecation free, every week.
The Minister said that in order to make the rural areas of the state open defecation free the state government has already embarked a major program under which 10 districts of the state have been made open defecation free. He said that more than half villages of Patiala and Mansa district have also been made open defecation free. Mr. Bajwa said that though the Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh has set the target of end of this year to make the state open defecation free, but the department was trying its best to achieve this goal by November end.
