Narendra Modi: More cleanliness achieved in 4 years than in previous 65

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday launched Swachhata Hi Seva cleanliness is service movement by interacting with common people and personalities from diverse fields through video conferencing at 17 locations and said the country has achieved more in sanitation coverage in the last four years than that in the last 6065 yearsThe interaction stretching about two hours included with industrialist Ratan Tata actor Amitabh Bachchan Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and spiritual leaders Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev Maa Amritanandamayee Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and Dadi Janki besides devotees from Ajmer Sharif dargah and Patna Sahib GurudwaraModi performed shramdaan manual labour at Babasaheb Ambedkar Higher Secondary School in Delhi after his video interaction An official release said the Prime Minister drove to the school and back in normal traffic without customary protocol and no special traffic arrangements were made for his visitThe Swachhata Hi Seva movement aims at boosting public participation in the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan and is being organised in the runup to the fourth anniversary of the Swachh Bharat Mission on October 2 next month which will also mark the commencement of the 150th birth anniversary celebrations of Mahatma GandhiIn his remarks during video conferencing Modi said cleanliness coverage was 40 per cent in 2014 and it now has grown to over 90 per cent on account of peoples effortsWho could have thought that we will progress so much in cleanliness coverage in the last four years that could not be achieved in the last 6065 years Could anybody have thought that nine crore toilets will be built in the country in four years Had anybody imagined that about 45 lakh villages over 450 districts and 20 states and Union Territories will become opendefecationfree ODF in four years he saidModi said the day marks a new resolve new enthusiasm and a new dream Today 125 crore citizens are going to repeat the pledge of cleanliness is service From today till October 2 we all will contribute with new energy and enthusiasm to make the country clean he saidWe can say with pride that every section every community every caste people of every age are taking this big campaign forward Whether it is village city street or a corner no part of the country is untouched by the campaign he addedModi said that toilets can be provided and efforts made for proper waste management but cleanliness is a habit which has to be included in daily experience This a yagna for change in behaviour in which all of you are taking partHe said the name of swachhagrahis cleanliness workers will be written in golden letters when history of this movement is writtenThe way the freedom fighters and martyrs are viewed with respect your contribution will also be remembered with the same respect as a true inheritor of revered Bapus legacy because you have become a soldier in efforts to rebuild the country save lives of the poor and restoring the countrys image in the worldThere is immense power in 125 crore citizens our enthusiasm is on the rise and our pledge is to achieve success he saidThe Prime Minister interacted with school children from Dibrugarh in Assam members of milk and agriculture cooperatives assembled in Mehsana personnel of ITBP from the highaltitude Pangong Lake in Ladakh women swachhagrahis from Dantewada in Chhattisgarh and Salem in Tamil Nadu citizens from Rajgarh in Madhya Pradesh and Fatehpur in Uttar Pradesh volunteers engaged in cleaning the Ganga from Bijnor in Uttar Pradesh and railway employees from Rewari in HaryanaYogi Adityanath who was in Fatehpur in Uttar Pradesh said during the video interaction that the state would become ODF by October 2 2019 and his government had constructed over 136 crore toilets in the last 17 monthsHe said cleanliness was a distant dream for 99000 villages of the state four years ago and only about 25 lakh toilets were built in the state by the previous Samajwadi Party government in about twoandahalf years since the launch of the Clean India campaign on October 2 2014Amitabh Bachchan said he found TV to be an effective way to spread the message of cleanliness and people should focus on ensuring their immediate surroundings are cleanRatan Tata said sanitation and cleanliness are important factors in ensuring good health of peopleTo be a strong India the foundation has to be strong and that foundation is the health of our people We can reduce and eliminate several diseases if we support the Swachh Bharat movement he saidCatch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updatesThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Except for the change in the headline the story has been provided ASIS AS AVAILABLE without any verification or editing from our side Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text 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