Guwahati: Guwahati Development Department (GDD) Minister Siddhartha Bhattacharya on Tuesday inaugurated the Flying Squad and Mass Awareness Campaign near Supermarket Ground in Guwahati.
It is to be noted that these Flying squads will consist of 6 multipurpose workers per squad.
Six squads will be deployed (one squad per division).
The flying squad will be responsible for emergency situations like garbage cleaning, removal of drain blockage and other essential sanitation services in the city.
The Government of India has approved the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)-assisted Rs 1,178.75 Crores Guwahati sewerage project. The proposed project objective is to provide reliable sewerage services by carrying out the construction of sewerage facilities and an extensive network of sewers in South & East Guwahati, thereby considerably improving sanitation and living conditions of people in Guwahati City.
As a prelude to encouraging cities to improve urban sanitation, Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs (formerly Ministry of Urban Development) had conducted ‘Swachh Survekshan-2016’ survey for the rating of 73 cities in January 2016 followed by ‘Swachh Survekshan-2017’ conducted in January- February 2018 ranking 434 cities. In a bid to scale up the coverage of the ranking exercise and encourage towns and cities to actively implement mission initiatives in a timely and innovative manner, MoHUA now proposes to conduct its third survey to rank all 4041 cities based on assessment of progress from January 2017 till December 2017 under Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban (SBM-U).
The objective of the survey is to encourage large scale citizen participation and create awareness amongst all sections of society about the importance of working together towards taking towns and cities a better place to live in. Additionally, the survey also intends to foster a spirit of healthy competition among towns and cities to improve their service delivery to citizens, towards creating cleaner cities.
Guwahati had participated in the previous Swachh Survekshans securing 50th and 134th in Swachh Survekshan 2016 (73 cities) and Swachh Survekshan 2017 (434 cities) respectively. Presently, the Guwahati Municipal Corporation is preparing for Swachh Survekshan 2018. A schedule for the training of officials, officers and other employees is in preparation and analysis of previous Survekshan is being done and necessary steps are being taken in order to rectify the drawbacks.