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As Pune’s swachh rank drops, PMC turns to employees, families for positive feedback
PMC’s many departments have been instructed to download the Swachhata app and register positive feedback about the city via the application in the vote for your city citizens’ feedback category
After Pune city’s ranking declined from fifth to ninth in the Swachh Survekshan 2022 category of cities having a population of over 10 lakh, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has decided to seek assistance from families of PMC employees.
The civic body has urged family members of PMC employees to submit favourable feedback for Swachh Survekshan 2023 (SS2023) and help the city improve its ranking.
According to Additional Municipal Commissioner Kunal Khemanr, the theme of the 2023 survey is ‘Waste to Wealth,’ and a detailed toolkit about the same has been announced by the State government.
To assess the cleanliness of the city, the government established several criteria and assigned a score. This will include analysing online comments from the city’s youth (age 15 to 29) and its senior citizens (age 60 and above).
As a result, all officers and staff from PMC’s many departments have been instructed to download the Swachhata app and register positive feedback about the city via the application in the vote for your city citizens’ feedback category.
Every officer/employee should educate his relatives and friends about this in order to receive as much good feedback as possible.
In addition, the officer/employee’s or their family member’s name and mobile number should be saved and sent to the Swachh Survekshan War room.
Dr Ketaki Ghatge, assistant medical officer, the Department of Solid Waste who is handling the Survekshan said, “It is not compulsory to officers and employees, it is just an appeal for the city. PMC employees are the citizens of the city as well and they can also contribute or participate in Swachh Survekshan-2023., which will help to boost our ranking.”
According to Ghatge, the civic body is reaching out to the public too. “We have also approached school and colleges but examination and admissions is going on at school and colleges. Therefore, it looks difficult to get responses from schools and colleges. Therefore, we are appealing to citizens to post or register positive feedback to improve Pune’s ranking in SS2023.”
Vivek Velankar, a Pune-based civic activist said, “It has been proven in the last few years ranking in Swachh Survekshan, they cannot do much to improve ranking at the ground. The ground reality is different from positive feedback. Therefore, they are trying to bag points through the citizen’s positive feedback category. They can only do that with the help of PMC employees and their family members as employees have no choice but to give positive feedback.”
In 2019, the then-PMC commissioner Saurabh Rao warned all municipal employees of disciplinary action unless they registered good remarks and reviewed the Swachh Survekshan application. As Pune was ranked tenth in Swachh Survekshan in 2018, he desired to be ranked first in 2019. The PMC government was heavily criticised for ranking 27th in Swachh Survekshan in 2019.