‘Toilet’ Gifts For Amethi Women This Raksha Bandhan

For the women of Amethi village in Uttar Pradesh, toilets are a luxury which only a few have. Now to give every woman a chance of using toilets at home and end open defecation, men have joined in the effort of gifting women toilets on this Raksha Bandhan.

The Zila Swachchhata Samiti (district committee for sanitation) has started a programme “Anokhi Amethi Ka Anokha Bhai” to create awareness about the evils of open defecation and educate people about it.

Under the campaign, a total of 854 men have registered themselves as ‘Brothers’ with the district committee to gift restrooms to women on the auspicious occasion of Raksha Bandhan. The Chief Development Officer of Amethi, Apurva Dubey, said that these men will build the restrooms out of their own resources, Indian Express reported.

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Dubey also emphasized that the project will be monitored till completion. She said that a team of officials will be deployed to check and verify the construction of toilets. Those who build the toilets will be eligible for a lucky draw in which three winners would be chosen. The winners will win cash prize of up to Rs 50,000 and mobiles. These prizes will be given to the winners at a district-level programme.

It was PM Narendra Modi who brought attention to having toilets at home in rural areas under his Swacch Bharat Abhiyan initiative. The initiative has encouraged many villages to crusade against this social evil.

In March this year, two women had filed a police complaint about missing toilets in Chhattisgarh. The women of Amarpur village in Bilaspur claimed that they had applied for construction of toilets with the village panchayat about two years back. But they have not been built while the Panchayat officials claim that they have been built as it has been registered in their log.

Picture credit- Livemint