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DUSIB launches community-based monitoring of toilets, night shelters
The move comes ahead of winter when the crowd at DUSIB night shelters swells. A centralised control room has been established where complaints via phone calls, WhatsApp, text messages, email and other modes will be received and relayed to officials on the field to get them resolved in a timebound manner
The Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board (DUSIB), the slums management agency of the Delhi government, on Monday launched a community based monitoring of its 195 night shelters, and public toilets used by nearly 2.5 million people daily in Delhi.
The move comes ahead of winter when the crowd at DUSIB night shelters swells. A centralised control room has been established where complaints via phone calls, WhatsApp, text messages, email and other modes will be received and relayed to officials on the field to get them resolved in a timebound manner.
The inmates in night shelters often hesitate to report problems to managers in person, fearing a reprisal, but this indirect mode of feedback may encourage them to flag problems, DUSIB officials believe. However, a problem inherent with that reasoning is that not many among those who use night shelters and community toilets have mobile phones nor access to internet connectivity, let alone an emailing facility.
When asked about this, a DUSIB official insisted that lodging complaints through phone calls or digitally is not likely to be an issue as nearly 66% people living in the Delhi slums use mobile phones, as per Census 2011. Even in night shelters, the use of phones is prevalent, the official said, asking not to be named.
K Mahesh, chief executive officer of DUSIB, said the agency provides seven basic services to slum dwellers in 675 colonies spread across the capital, including the community toilets and night shelters to the homeless. “Among the services , 673 jan suvidha complexes (community toilets) containing 22,397 Indian toilet seats are used by nearly 2.5 million people, mostly living in slums, free of cost,” said Mahesh.
“A number of complaints were received from MLAs and others about the poor maintenance of toilets. Therefore, a centralised and integrated control room has been established in the office of DUSIB. The control room will receive complaints on the phone number --9871013284 -- in the form of calls, WhatsApp text/audio/video messages, photos, and email. The complaints will be relayed to officials on the field in the 12 divisions to get the problems fixed as soon as possible,” said Mahesh.
The integrated control room was inaugurated by Sanjay Goel, secretary urban development and director local bodies. The complaints regarding community toilets can be made at 011-23370559, for night shelters, please call on 011-23378789 & 011-23370560. The toll-free number is 14461 and the WhatsApp number is 9871013284.
“The integrated control room is functional round the clock and is manned by a team of eight officials under the active supervision of a director level officer,” said Mahesh.
DUSIB has introduced a compliance monitoring mechanism as well to ensure that complaints are acted on in a timebound manner.
“The engineer concerned after taking necessary remedial action , as per the given timelines, shall upload time stamped and geo-tagged pictures to show compliance,” said Mahesh.
According to records kept by DUSIB, the number of persons using night shelters increase from nearly 7,000 to 12,000 between November 15 and March 15 every year. The DUSIB releases its elaborate winter action plan before every winter so as to ensure that the homeless do not have to brave it out in the cold.
The agency also sets up several temporary night shelters during winter to accommodate the increase in crowd. In previous years DUSIB set up around 300 tents at 80 locations as temporary shelters.
