GANDHINAGAR: Mahatma Gandhi famously said, “So long as you do not take the broom and the bucket in your hands, you cannot make your towns and cities clean.” Taking this motto close to their heart, residents of
Motipura, a village about 27km from state capital
Gandhinagar, undertook a drive to not only clean their village completely through a competition but also celebrated ‘swachhata pratishthan’ (installation of
cleanliness) with a community meal on Saturday evening.
Parthesh Pandya, an environment educator from near Rajpur village, played role of catalyst in the initiative, as he put together the local
gram panchayat officials, local youths and a group of 18 students from Institute of Technology of Nirma University (NU) who camped in the village as part of their National Service Scheme (NSS) initiative.
“Everyone knows the benefits of cleanliness, but more often than not it is confined to one’s own home. We wanted to break that mould and extend it to their immediate surroundings, and eventually to the entire village,” said Pandya. “To make it exciting for the participants, we gave the drive the shape of a competition. We divided the 200 houses and population of 1,100 into roughly nine wards. The best household in each ward would get a token prize of Rs 1,000 and the best ward would get a prize of Rs 7,000,” he added.
Vikas Pandey, BTech student from NU and part of the NSS initiative, said that two students were assigned to each ward where they worked closely with the local youth. “We felt that the youth were more receptive of the ideas and they played a major role in taking the drive to each household,” he said.
On Saturday, independent observers visited each household for inspection as the entire village looked spick and span after shedding about 12 trailer-loads of trash. Veena Patel, resident of Patel Faliyu, said that the team talked about very simple but effective ways in which mosquitoes, and by extension ailments, can be kept at bay.
The observers looked at parameters such as keeping all stored water covered, not allowing algae to cover any puddle or open water, keeping the toilet clean, washing hands before cooking or meals and proper disposal of wet and dry waste.
Niyal Patel, sarpanch of the village, said that he is happy with the results.
“Generally, a community meal is organized when a deity is installed in a temple to mark the occasion. We, on Saturday, have installed cleanliness in the village and thus have organized the mass meal,” said. “From Monday, we have also organized door-to-door collection of waste after segregation. We are also going to provide two dustbins for the purpose. So far, the general practice was to burn it,” he said.
