Prime Minister Narendra Modi today said that behavioural change is needed to achieve the dream of Swachch Bharat.
Inaugurating the India Sanitation conference (INDOSAN) here, the Prime Minister reiterated the importance of recycling and reusing waste to create wealth and called for ‘Swachhagraha’ or insistence on cleanliness, like Mahatma Gandhi's ‘Satyagraha’.
“There is a need to ensure a dirt free India like Mahatma Gandhi's Satyagraha which was instrumental for the end of colonialism,” he said.
"Only budget allocations cannot further cleanliness. Like... 'Satyagraha' that freed us from the British, today there is need for 'Swachhagraha' to make India free from filth," he added.
"The cleanliness movement has spread its root in a very short time. But to make it effective, people should develop a strong sense of cleanliness and an equal dislike for dirt," the PM further said.
Emphasising on the concepts of reuse and recycle, the Prime Minister said that people needed to create wealth from waste.
"We need to recreate wealth from waste. We can bring a very big change by effectively reusing things and recycling waste. The concept of reuse and recycle has traditionally been part of our habit. We need to make these more technology driven," he said.
Modi also said the government has taken an important decision to buy electricity generated from waste material to promote the initiative.
Union Minister for Rural Development, Drinking Water and Sanitation and Panchayati Raj Narendra Singh Tomar said that by October 2 this year, one lakh villages will become Open Defecation Free (ODF) while 40 districts across the country will achieve ODF status in the current financial year.
At present 87,666 villages are ODF, apart from 1,544 villages in Namami Gange areas. So far 24 districts have been declared as ODF.
Sikkim is the only state which has achieved the ODF status, and Kerala, Haryana, Gujrat and Maharashtra will soon achieve the ODF status.
With IANS Inputs
