e-toilets turn white elephant for MC

Parveen Arora

Tribune News Service

Karnal, July 15

In an effort to improve health and sanitation standards along with taking a step forward for achieving the smart city tag, the district administration had installed five e-toilets, fully automated public toilets with the cost of Rs 5 lakh each, at various places in June 2015, but all are lying non-functional for the last several months.

With the non-maintenance these high-end toilets have proved to be a white elephant. If the sources in the Karnal Municipal Corporation are to be believed then the maintenance cost of these toilets are too high to be afforded by the KMC, so these were locked days after they were inaugurated.

People are considering it wastage of taxpayers’ money and saying there is no point in installing these toilets when they serve no purpose. Rohit Kumar, a shopkeeper on Kunjpura road, said that it was just an example of how taxpayers’ money was being wasted by the administration. Two toilets were installed near post office, but they were locked since their inauguration and prove to be worthless serving no purpose.

“I have never found these toilets to be of any use. It was just wastage of money and the administration should have checked the feasibility of these toilets before installing them,” said Rajiv Kumar, another trader of Kunjpura road.

The first e-toilet of the district was installed on the premises of Mini-Secretariat with the efforts of then Deputy Commissioner J Ganesan under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, but it is also lying non-functional under the nose of the administration as all top officials of the district administration sit in the Mini-Secretariat.

As per the authorities, these toilets have the facility of an automated door opening, power flushing, automatic closet washing and sterilisation and automatic platform-cleaning mechanism. A coin of Rs 2 has to be inserted in the slot at the entry point. Subsequently, the door is opened and occupancy of the cabin is displayed outside. After every five uses, it automatically flushes the floor. There was a planning to install such more e-toilets in the city.

Deputy Commissioner Aditya Dahiya said that these toilets were maintained by the KMC and he would ask the authorities to get them functional.

“The toilets were installed with the sole purpose of providing better facilities for residents, but the maintenance cost is high. We are exploring all options to get them operational,” said Raiv Mehta, Commissioner, KMC.