50 Faridabad villages end open defecation
WOMEN POWER Villagers are now using toilets, thanks to the unrelenting efforts of the women sarpanches
FARIDABAD: Nearly 50 villages in Faridabad district gained independence from open defecation on August 15, thanks to the sustained efforts of the women heads.
“The people of 24 villages of Ballabgarh block and 26 villages of Faridabad block are using toilets now and no person was found defecating,” government sources said.
“We constituted committees and the members campaigned in favour of cleanliness in the village,” said Dayawati, Sarpanch of Palwali village. “In case any person did not listen to our pleas and defecate in the open, we would name and shame him in the village,” she said.
“This campaign worked and we succeeded in fulfilling our commitment made before the district officials recently,” Dayawati told HT.
Similar were the sentiments of Sarpanch Teekawali. “We used to visit homes and advise people to use toilets”, said Preeti, village head of Teekawali. “The campaign was hectic. But, it yielded results,” she said.
“We are enjoying real independence now as people stopped visiting open for answering call of nature,” she added. Earlier, HT had reported how officials and the villagers were working overtime to ensure that the villages become open defecation free.
Officials would wake up in the dead of the night, rush to remote villages and catch people defecating under bushes and open farmlands.
They would take the help of the village elders to teach them civic lessons. There are 116 panchayats in Faridabad district alone, out of which 47 have woman sarpanchs.
The district administration of Faridabad had set the deadline of August 15 for making these women-headed villages free from open defecation.
A detailed presentation was made by senior state government officers before all 116 sarpanchs in Faridabad recently. after being educated about how open defecation causes health hazards and how cleanliness improves the quality of life, the sarpanchs took oath to make their villages free from open defecation. The two dates were finalised .
For 47 villages headed by women sarpanches, August 15, 2016 was the deadline. For the remaining villages headed by male Sarpanchs, November 1, 2016 is the deadline.