No support from dist admn, councillors in Swachh Survekshan, says Jogpal

Tribune News Service

Panchkula, July 7

The district administration and councillors are responsible for the 142nd rank of Panchkula in the Swachh Survekshan-2018. There was no support from Municipal Councillors in getting open defecation free (ODF) tag for Panchkula city.

This was stated by Municipal Commissioner Rajesh Jogpal while addressing sanitary workers during a programme, which was organised at Red Bishop, Sector 1, to felicitate sanitary workers for maintaining Panchkula as open defecation free (ODF) and getting 142nd rank out of 4,203 cities in the country.

“Had we got their (district administration and Municipal Councillors) support, Panchkula’s rank could have been much better in survey. Even the MC could have come in the top 50,” said Jogpal.

“Despite getting no support from these quarters, Panchkula has improved its ranking from 211 in 2017 to 142 in 2018. It is a major achievement and sanitary workers have played a major role in securing the 142nd rank out of more than 4,000 cities across the country,” he added.

“Indore has secured first position in the survey because of support from sanitary workers, public and the MC House. But in Panchkula the picture is entirely different. We get less help from public and the MC House. The administration even refused to spare officers for teams, which were to be formed for shortlisting places for the Swachh Awards. We had to call officers from the Income Tax Department and HUDA, who worked for these awards,” he said.

“It was a major challenge before the Panchkula Municipal Corporation (MC) to improve its ranking, but we managed to do improve our rank with help of civic body officials and sanitary workers,” he added.

“I joined as the Panchkula MC Commissioner in the last week of September 2017. I had barely three months for preparation as Swachh Survekshan teams arrived in January this year. After taking charge I had sought help from the then district administration, but the response was lukewarm from their side,” said Jogpal.

Last year, Gauri Parashar Joshi was Panchkula’s Deputy Commissioner (DC), who went on leave on January 17 this year. Thereafter, ADC Mukul Kumar was given additional charge of Panchkula DC. Later, he was given regular charge of the DC on July 3.

66-day survey

The Swachh Survekshan was flagged off in July 2017 and field assessment started on January 4, 2018. The survey was completed in 66 days, according to the Union Ministry.

Ranks 4th in Haryana

Panchkula stands fourth among 18 cities in Haryana, behind Karnal (41), Rohtak (89) and Gurugram (105). The city scored 2,368.68 marks out of 4,000 and lost many numbers on various grounds, the major one being solid waste management plant. The Swachh Survekshan-2018 assessed local bodies on service-level progress of waste operations (35%), citizen feedback (35%) and independent field observation (30%).

The assessment criteria for survey

• Part 1: Collection of data from service-level progress (1,400 marks).
• Part 2: Collection of data from direct observations (1,200 marks).
• Part 3: Collection of data from citizens’ feedback (1,400 marks).