The government on Tuesday declared Puducherry as Open Defecation Free at a function coinciding with the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.
Minister for Public Works A. Namassivayam read out the declaration in the presence of Lt Governor Kiran Bedi, Minister for Education R. Kamalakannan, Member of Parliament R. Radhakrishnan and senior officials. “Its a historic day for Puducherry,” the Lieutenant Governor said on declaring Puducherry ODF.
Ms. Bedi in a message said women have benefited the most from the ODF programme.
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“The rural project officer has reported that women in Puducherry were the 100% beneficiaries of the movement. They have a protected space for sanitary facilities which they never had earlier,” the Lt. Governor said.
She said the construction of toilets had reduced incidents of sexual abuse in rural areas. It had restored the women their dignity and physical health as they can use the toilets when they wanted, Ms. Bedi said. “We have a few issues to resolve still, such as toilets in rented houses in rural areas and houses built on temple. These issues will be sorted out in the coming weeks,” he said.
In a presentation, Project Officer P. T Rudra Goud, said the initial estimate was to construct 9,626 toilets in urban areas and 45,403 toilets in rural areas. Later the figures were reworked to 8,611 and 28,002 in urban and rural areas respectively.
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Cost of toilet
The total cost of a twin pit toilet was ₹20,000. The Central Government had given ₹12,000 per toilet for rural areas and ₹4,000 for urban areas.
The remaining amount was spent by the Puducherry government.