Has the garbage vehicle not arrived to pick up the waste from your house ? Do you find the unswept road or the sight of garbage dump near your house nauseating ? You don’t have to suffer the lack of hygiene in your vicinity any more for you can download the mobile app — Swachhata— the official mobile app of the Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD), click a picture and submit your complaint.
The complaint will automatically be forwarded to the civic body concerned and to the designated sanitary official of the civic body to attend to the complaint within the fixed time frame. The official has to not only ensure that the complaint is redressed, but also take a picture and upload the same as part of the feedback provided to the complainant.
The app, compatible with all devices, and built by IchangeMyCity — a divsion of Janaagraha, a Bengaluru-based non-profit organisation — was launched in August this year, but adopted by the Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) about three to four weeks ago.
“Ever since we adopted the app, we have received a total of 550 complaints and redressed almost all of them, including 367 within the stipulated time frame,” Health Officer, MCC, Dr. D.G. Nagaraju, who is overseeing the implementation of the exercise in Mysuru, told The Hindu.
For most of the complaints like clearing of garbage and sweeping of the road, the time frame stipulated for redressal is 12 hours except for complaints like removal of dead animals for which 48 hours is the time limit.
Even on Tuesday, Dr. Nagaraju said MCC had received a total of 33 complaints on the app.
“We have resolved all the complaints except four, where our personnel are on the job attending to the complaint. Even after we resolve the complaint, the complainant has an option to re-open the complaint if she or he is not satisfied,” he added.
Identifying the location is not much of a problem for MCC as the app, through GPS, will also indicate the the exact location of the area of the complaint.
MCC officials are taking up the complaints lodged on the app seriously as the response of the civic body to the complaints made on the app will receive weightage during the Swachh Survekshan, scheduled to be conducted during January 2017, as part of an exercise to rank different cities of the country on the cleanliness index.
Know your app
Download the Swachhata app from Playstore or App Store
Take a picture of the complaint using your smart phone
Post the picture on one of the following categories— garbage dump, garbage vehicle not arrived, dustbins not cleaned, sweeping not done, dead animals, public toilet cleaning, public toilet blockage, no water supply in public toilets, and no electricity in public toilets
The users of the app can also vote on any other complaint relevant to them
