Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal‏ Khattar Participates In Safai Abhiyan, Picks Up A Broom To Celebrate World Environment Day

On the World Environment Day, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal‏ Khattar launched the waste segregation drive by wielding a broom under state’s Safai Abhiyan, an offshoot to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. The Safai Abhiyan was launched last month as mass movement to clean state’s historic city. The Chief Minister swept a couple of colonies in the city and then went on to participate in the sweeping process organised at Kachhwa village.

The Chief Minister inaugurated the event by taking the swachhta pledge along with officials from the Karnal Municipal Corporation (KMC) and the residents.

As part of the segregation drive, he also did a symbolic distribution of blue and green bins to implement the practice of waste segregation at source in the city. “The civic body, in the coming few months, will distribute 85,000 bins for dry and wet waste across the city,” confirmed Dheeraj Singh, Executive Officer, KMC.

For source segregation, the Chief Minister flagged off another 20 Auto-Tippers, a vehicle for loading and offloading garbage. “At present the city has 30 such vehicles, but to upscale the cleanliness process, the chief minister added another 20,” Mr Singh tells NDTV.

Chief Minister also felicitated citizens for showing their enthusiasm and whole-heartedly participating in the Safai Abhiyan. One such awardee was Seema Devi, a housewife, who fought against open defecation by renting a toilet at Rs 500 per month. “Under the Swachh Grahni  (Housewife) category she was given a certificate for not only inspiring city’s women but also for taking a loan for constructing a toilet,” says Mr Singh.

While many states are revamping their waste collecting vehicles by creating internal compartments for bio-degradable and non-degradable garbage, the KMC will send out two separate trucks – one for dry waste and the other for wet waste, “Internal compartments can create a lot confusion for people especially in the beginning and waste segregation might not be effective. Hence, we have allotted trucks separately for two kinds of waste,” says Mr Singh.

Under the ‘Shehri Swachhta’ category, ward 4 was awarded for maintaining cleanliness and was given Rs 2 lakh. And Resident Welfare Association from sector 9 was given Rs 50,000.

Prime Minister Modi on his monthly ‘Mann Ki Baat’ had announced that a ‘massive’ waste management campaign will be launched in 4000 cities on June 5, World Environment Day and will continue till October 2. Once completed, India will attempt to set a world record of 100 per cent waste segregation with this campaign where maximum number of people will pledge to segregate waste.

Also Read: M Venkaiah Naidu Launched A Mega Waste Management Campaign On World Environment Day In Delhi: Your 10-Point Cheatsheet