58 villages of Giridih declared open defecation free

P Mishra

Giridih: Altogether 58 villages under six blocks of Naxal hit Giridih district in Jharkhand celebrated open defecation free (ODF) day on Sunday. Apart from Sirsiya village of Sihodih panchayat under  Giridih block those declared as ODF include the villages under naxal hit Deori, Bengabad, Jamua, Gandey and Pirtand blocks of the district.

It was for the first time when such a large number of villages of  Giridih was declared ODF.The Giridih district administration had sanctioned Rs 12,000 each to the residents of all 58 villages that were identified to be declared as ODF. Besides, the district administration also honored about 250 persons and termed them as ‘natural leaders for Swachhta’.

“The main objective of our celebration is to improve community participations so that we could speed up our activities meant to promote cleanliness and greeneries, the main objective of PM Narendra Modi’s ‘Swachha Bharat Mission’ across the region,” said Giridih deputy commissioner Umashankar Singh addressing the participants as well as hundreds of villagers at Sirsiya block headquarters of Giridih block.“ We will declare more than 200 remote villages as ODF within two months,” Singh added. Meanwhile, senior district and block officials, apart from people’s representatives like MLAs,  representatives of MPs and panchayat representatives held functions to celebrate the ODF days in the areas under their respective jurisdictions.