New Delhi: “Wholehearted participation of the citizens has made Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) a Jan Andolan (mass movement) across the country. Taking this momentum forward, I am delighted to launch the SBM (U) (Swachh Bharat Mission – Urban) e-Learning Application, an app powered by Microsoft India”, said Durga Shanker Mishra, Secretary, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, on Friday (March 8). The ‘SBM eLearning’ mobile application which is powered by Project Sangam of Microsoft India is a way to connect citizens with the nationwide cleanliness campaign as they learn new concepts in the field of sanitation and waste management like composting at home, refusing and reusing plastic and other things.
Wholehearted participation of the citizens has made Swachh Bharat Mission a Jan Andolan across the country. Taking this momentum forward, I am delighted to launch the SBM (U) e-Learning Application, an App powered by @MicrosoftIndia today. pic.twitter.com/VeEnRM6mjP
— Durga Shanker Mishra (@Secretary_MoHUA) March 8, 2019
The eLearning portal hosts online courses on different kinds of waste, waste management, toilet construction, IEC (Information, Education and Communication) campaigns undertaken by varied states and cities, municipal solid waste management plan and others. For easy understanding of users, the lessons are delivered through simple videos that can be accessed on both web and mobile application, currently available only for Android.
The online portal has successfully trained over 110,000 municipal functionaries across 4000 plus cities in India on best sanitation practices, claims Microsoft.
The #SwachhBharatMission's e-Learning Portal, which is powered by Project Sangam, has helped train 110,000+ municipal functionaries across 4,000+ cities on best sanitation practices. pic.twitter.com/wouhZ8KaHJ
— Microsoft India (@MicrosoftIndia) March 11, 2019
The Sangam platform was designed to train municipal functionaries of state sanitation missions, city managers – engineers, administrators, field supervisors, and sanitation workers with an aim to equip, assess, measure and accredit training of these officers, reads a press release by Microsoft India.
Also Read: Swachh Bharat Abhiyan Inspires Mumbai Society To Generate Revenue From Waste
The eLearning portal highlights examples of cities and institutions who have had success in terms of achieving their sanitation and waste management. Learning from these examples and then incorporating their success mantra is what the ‘SBM eLearning’ lessons hope to impart to municipal corporations and individuals.
For instance, when the problem of construction and demolition (C&D) waste piling up aggravated in the national capital Delhi, East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) resorted to PPP (Public Private Partnership) model, wherein C&D waste management plant was set up to convert the C&D waste into either sand or paver blocks or other construction material. In the tutorial, Amit Yadav, IAS, Municipal Commissioner, EDMC, talks about the city’s partnership with a private player in the collection and processing of the C&D waste.
Also Read: Waste To Wonder: All About Delhi’s New Theme Park ‘Seven Wonders Of The World’
SBM e-Learning 2.0
Taking the e-Learning portal a notch higher, MoHUA has launched the second phase wherein online courses are made available for citizens. The course has three levels – beginners, intermediate and advanced. While the course for beginners provides lessons on composting at home, environmental hazards of using plastic and how it can be reused, and recycled, locating nearest SBM toilet via phone; intermediate course focuses on educating users on how a city get garbage free star-rating and how an individual can contribute to it. Intermediate course also provide lessons on the importance of having a soak pit. Lastly, advanced course is all about best practices adopted by cities of India in terms of sanitary disposal, and bioremediation.
Also Read: Government Launches Smart Star-Rating For Garbage Free Cities: 5 Things You Should Know
The course library on portal also provides eight series of topics covering individual household toilets, community and public toilets, municipal solid waste management, and others. An individual can take up any course belonging to the eight series.
For instance, series 500 titled IEC and Public Awareness, divided into 10 courses, talks about waste management and IEC activities undertaken by varied cities in regard to waste management and sanitation. The first two lessons highlight the case study of Sabrimala temple in Kerala and describe the challenges faced in cleaning and maintaining a religious town that has lakhs of visitors per year. The video traces the journey of ‘Punyam Poonkavanam’ project of the Government of Kerala in cleaning and maintaining the surroundings of Sabarimala and the surrounding ecosystem of River Pampa and the Periyar Tiger Reserve.
Also Read: Sustainable Waste Management Is The Need Of The Hour: Minister Hardeep Singh Puri
In order to participate in the training, a user has to sign in, register for a course of his/her choice, go through all the videos and reading material related to the course and voila, he/she will get a swachh certificate.
While appealing citizens to take up these courses, Minister Durga Shanker Mishra, said, “Citizens can complete various levels of e-courses available on the app and learn as to how they can do more towards the cause of #Swachhata at their own dwelling places. I appeal to our fellow citizens to download this App now & become a #Swachhagrahi.”
Citizens can complete various levels of e-courses available on the App & learn as to how they can do more towards the cause of #Swachhata at their own dwelling places.
I appeal to our fellow citizens to download this App now & become a #Swachhagrahi. pic.twitter.com/g0eHGcJPaY
— Durga Shanker Mishra (@Secretary_MoHUA) March 8, 2019
NDTV – Dettol Banega Swachh India campaign lends support to the Government of India’s Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM). Helmed by Campaign Ambassador Amitabh Bachchan, the campaign aims to spread awareness about hygiene and sanitation, the importance of building toilets and making India open defecation free (ODF) by October 2019, a target set by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, when he launched Swachh Bharat Abhiyan in 2014. Over the years, the campaign has widened its scope to cover issues like air pollution, waste management, plastic ban, manual scavenging and menstrual hygiene. The campaign has also focused extensively on marine pollution, clean Ganga Project and rejuvenation of Yamuna, two of India’s major river bodies.
