Jamshedpur, Oct 2: Responding to the ongoing Swachch Bharat Abhiyaan, a group of prominent citizens of Steel City have joined hands to make Jamshedpur India�s cleanest city.
Swachata Abhiyan Forum that comprises of industrialists, businessmen and former officials of Tata Steel in order to evolve and involve ourselves has started a collective effort to clean up the areas in the city and not depend on agencies or Jusco to provide these services.
As a first step in this direction the group took out a rally comprising of school children, prominent and concerned citizens from Postal Park in Bistupur to the N Road crossing and back. During the rally citizens with a simple bamboo stick split like a large pair of tweezers picked up garbage littered on the road and collected it in the polythene bags.
“We decided to clean the Bistupur Main Road during the rally as it was polluted with garbage lying everywhere. We interacted with the residents there and they immediately agreed to participate in the cleaning,” said Industrialist RK Agarwal, a member of the group.
While cleaning the area, the group managed to collect several polythene bags of garbage.
Dr. Tridibesh Mukherjee, former senior official of Tata Steel and brain behind this campaign said, �Jamshedpur has always been a beacon to the rest of the country in all forms of civic amenities; be it water or electricity supply, smooth roads, parks and even in the level of cleanliness of its public spaces.
However, we citizens have generally looked to agencies or Jusco to provide these services but it�s high time we should evolve and involve ourselves, Mukherjee added saying that we propose the slogan �Swach Karenge, Swach Rakhenge� as our guiding principle. The cleanliness here should inspire more people to maintain the sanitation�, he added.
Mukherjee further said, China uses a simple bamboo stick split like a large pair of tweezers to pick up garbage and Singapore uses pedal rickshaws with built in bins to collect garbage. These are not very hi-tech equipments but are essential in order to make Jamshedpur as No. 1 City in Cleanliness.
Another former Tata Steel Official and member of the group Niroop Mohanty said, in the first leg of the campaign, 4 Rickshaws have been provided to Dhatkidih, Jugsalai, Kadma and Sakchi and the rickshaws will move on regularly from October 3 to enable the picked garbage to be deposited and later transported to the dumping areas.
The group plans to conduct similar drives in other areas of the city with the cooperation of citizens.
�Residents of Bistupur area have lent their valuable time to the cause. Since there are many other areas in the city, we want to conduct more such drives to ensure better hygiene,” said Rupa, another member.