Lack of civic sense, in abundance
Paanstained walls, stinking toilets, dirty staircases and filthy almirahs ‘hallmarks’ of Jawahar Bhawan and Indira Bhawan
Chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s emphasis on cleanliness drives in government offices seems to be falling on deaf ears within his own administration with key government buildings like Jawahar Bhawan and Indira Bhawan setting a bad example.
The twin buildings, housing more than 70 government offices, are in a pathetic condition. Toilets here are stinking, staircases are full of paan stains while amirahs, where records are stored, are not free of dirt.
On the premises, over 60 government vehicles are parked for over a year. The area is full of unwanted grass and people also urinate here in the open. But the officials of estate department have found no time to address the issue despite the matter being raised by general secretary of Jawahar Bhawan Indira Bhawan employees’ confederation Susheel Kumar Baccha with the former estate officer Brijraj Yadav (who was transferred on Tuesday).
Susheel Kumar Baccha says, “Every day, we clean our houses. We clean, because we care. But do we care about our office in the same manner? We spend at least 10 hours of a day at our workplace, which must be kept clean. This awareness campaign was started by the confederation a one month ago and it has started yielding results too. But I agree that a lot has to be done as everything cannot be changed overnight.”
There’s no regular cleaning in the two buildings where 20,000 employees work and around 50,000 floating visitors produce at least 50 grams of waste every day.
The toilets are also stinking. A number of employees said they suffered UTI infections after using the washrooms of the office building.
Worse still, the water tank on the top floor has been turned into a dump yard. It has become a breeding place for mosquitoes and is so filthy that one cannot withstand the stink for even a minute, said Satish Pandey, president, Jawahar Bhawan Indira Bhawan Employees’ Confederation.
However, the official of estate department was not ready to come on record on the issue. “We know the problems. People must be stopped from carrying gutkha, paan inside the offices and defacing walls. We are painting the office again, but what is the guarantee that it would not be defaced again? he asked.
“When we try to stop anyone from defacing the building, the union people come and create problems,” he added.